100 Days, 100 Drabbles
by fearlessgurl283
Summary: And so your humble author once again tries to write for 100 consecutive days. Preview for the 100th drabble: I’m against killing him...because I just can’t end things this way. I can’t—won’t—stoop to his level. I won’t be a killer. NOW COMPLETE!
1. Pineapple

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Pineapple  
**Word count:** 63 (Yes, rather short)  
**Warnings:** Craziness. A lot of it. And just general randomness.  
**Notes:** And so your humble author once again tries to write for 100 consecutive days. XD Let's see if she succeeds...

(These drabbles will try to be of the general genre, but may be a pairing or two later--we'll see. Oh and I wrote this while eating lovely crushed pineapple. Wish it were the stuff I ate in Hawaii, but good enough for my muse to make me write stuff.)

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**Pineapple:**

The taste filled my mouth, sweet but tart liquid flowing down my throat.

"Crushed pineapple…" the words came slowly, full of remembrance.

"Hmm?" He looked at me curiously now.

"...nothing." An image of Sokka, with his head crammed in the large fruit, filled my mind.

"It's good, isn't it?" A vision of Toph floundering on the floor, laughing. _Good, oh yes_.


	2. Wisdom

Next drabble!

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Wisdom (002/100)  
**Word count:** 172 (A bit longer than last time)  
**Warnings:** More craziness and QUOTATIONS OF DOOM!  
**Notes:** This is me just letting my fingers do the typing, and letting the GENERALness of the drabble flow. Except for Toph, because she's too awesome to remain unnamed. :3

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**Wisdom:**

"Sometimes I think you see better than I do."

"…I'm blind, you do realize that, right?"

"Yeah."

"…"

"…"

"Although even _I_ never would have seen _that_ coming—"

"…that's beside the point."

"That's _exactly_ the point. If you two—"

"I get it, _o wise one_."

"Hey, wisdom doesn't come cheap, y'know. I charge per ounce."

"…your sarcasm is overwhelming."

"As they always say, practice makes—"

"—perfect, I know."

"That's not what I was going to say."

"Oh really?"

"No, actually I was going to say practice doesn't make perfect. _Perfect_ practice makes perfect."

"…how did we get on this subject again?"

"I don't know, you tell me. Something to do with how you and—"

"That's where you went off tangent."

"You were the one who asked for advice."

"I did? Remind me to never ask again."

"Suit yourself."

"I will."

"…oh and while you're at it, tell those two to cool it. I really hate waking up in the middle of the night from the nightmares."


	3. Regret

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Regret (003/100)  
**Word count:** 45 (Very short)  
**Warnings:** Sadness, a more serious drabble than the last two.  
**Notes:** Each statement was written for a different character, though some can be all and all can be some. (If that makes any sense at all)

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**Regret:**

I'm sorry.

For running away.

For not being strong enough.

For caring too much.

For not being enough.

For losing my way.

For changing too much.

For breaking your heart.

For crushing mine first.

_Maybe someday I'll be strong enough to tell you._


	4. Truth and Lies

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Truth and Lies  
**Word count:** 44 (Short again :P)  
**Warnings:** Azula written as I've never written her before.  
**Notes:** This is a worst case scenario of Azula. Cause I thinks she's better than this, but maybe not. :X

* * *

**Truth and Lies**

_My own mother thinks I'm a monster._ And she's right, of course. As they always say, _mother knows best_.

But now she's dead, and who knows best now? _Who picked best_?

Mother dearest, your beloved son will soon be joining you.


	5. Night

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Night  
**Word count:** 155  
**Warnings:** _Creepy and horrific.  
_**Notes:** I totally did not plan the end like this. :X

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**Night**

The screams came the first night, piercing the still air with their terrifying pitches. The wails shook the palace upside down, the silence shattered within seconds. The walls shook with every second that passed by, trembling with horror as the screeches reached a new octave.

And yet, the palace was silent.

The second night the nightmares took on a new tune, and moaning replaced the screams. The words slurred together, unable to be understood and yet comprehensive all the same, the words so familiar.

No one awoke.

The third night the sleep walking started. Figurines and priceless vases crashed to the floor. In the morning there would be no memory, nothing but the shards of glass ingrained in the bottom of a pair of feet to suggest guilt.

The fourth night the silence echoed through the walls. A pair of haunted amber eyes sprung open, and three words passed from the still lips.

"I killed Mother."


	6. Broken

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Broken  
**Word count:** 55 (Short, yet again, but not meaningless P)  
**Warnings:** Zuko angst.  
**Notes:** Yea, I've been getting a lot of inspiration from The Beach episode. ' Those character revelations just really gave a lot more to the characters, and at the same time basically reiterated what we already knew (or inferred).

* * *

**Broken**

_Well, at least I __feel__ something_. But maybe it was too much. Maybe she was right; maybe it was smarter to keep your emotions hidden from the world. Maybe if he hid his emotions he wouldn't be such an emotional wreck. _Maybe if he pretended not to care it wouldn't hurt so much_.


	7. Identity

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Identity  
**Word count:** 68  
**Warnings:** none  
**Notes:** This is inspired by _My Sister's Keeper_ by Jodi Picoult. I have no idea why this popped into my head, because though this was my summer reading book for school this year, I haven't read or thought about the novel in months. :P

And no, the italics aren't an accident.

* * *

**Identity**

_I just don't know what to do anymore. I have everything I've always wanted and yet I'm more lost than ever._

_Maybe it's the wrong path then. Maybe what you want isn't what you really want; just what you thought you wanted. Maybe it's not what you really need._

_You don't know who I am._

_Maybe so, but neither do you._


	8. Circle

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Circle  
**Word count:** 187 (without lyrics)  
**Notes:** Lyrics are from "Wake Me Up When September Ends" by Green Day. Oh and I have no idea where the heck this came from.

* * *

**Circle**

_summer has come and passed_

_the innocent can never last_

_wake me up when september ends_

The pain consumed him, and for one brief moment, he thought he was going to die. Dead already, even. Spirits help him, take this horrible pain_ away._ The ringing in his ears was unbearable, but nothing compared to the harsh words he had just endured.

_like my fathers come to pass_

_seven years has gone so fast_

_wake me up when september ends_

_The Avatar is alive_. Four words that had once brought his life to purpose; and now brought it to a screeching halt. He finally had everything he ever wanted _(love, honor, purpose_) just for it to be snatched from his greedy hands once again.

_here comes the rain again_

_falling from the stars_

_drenched in my pain again_

_becoming who we are_

_Who are you, Zuko?_ He cannot answer, and so he instead stares away in vain, searching for an answer that is not there. (_Maybe it never was, maybe it always was_, _maybe he was just too blind to see it)_

_as my memory rests_

_but never forgets what I lost_

_wake me up when september ends_

The flames blind him once more, and he is reminded of the beginning. How it all started. How he thought it would end. _(foolishly, of course_) He knows better now, and knows finally that maybe there is hope.

_For this time maybe he will be strong enough to finally let go, and end it once and for all._


	9. The Eighth Sin

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** The Eighth Sin (009/100)  
**Word count:** 83  
**Notes:** Inspired by "A Northern Light" by Jennifer Donnelly. (Also, "Spirits" in the passage really should be "God"—but I didn't think this was appropriate with the Avatar world, so I changed it)

* * *

**The Eighth Sin**

"You're going to be alright, Aang; you're going to be alright." She repeats it as a mantra, more to keep her mind occupied and away from the deadly thoughts than anything. For he cannot—he just cannot be de—he just _can't_.

She is prideful, shamefully, and is guilty of many of the other Seven Deadly Sins, that much is true. But this is one of many times when she is reminded of the sin the Spirits left out.

_Hope._


	10. The Tenth Circle

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** The Tenth Circle (010/100)  
**Word count:** 183  
**Warnings:** dark themes  
**Notes:** Inspired by "The Tenth Circle" by Jodi Picoult, another novel you all really need to read if you haven't already.

(And, woot! 1/10 of the way done! xD)

* * *

**The Tenth Circle**

The iron bars feel cold beneath his grip and he knows they are fire-proof, able to resist even the flame of a master firebender. But at the moment, it didn't look as if such measures were needed for this prisoner, this miserable excuse of a man withering away in the cell.

_You're a crazy old man! You're crazy, and if you weren't in jail, you'd be sleeping in a gutter!_ And yet he is the one clutching the bars like a lunatic, raving at a man who refuses to talk to him. _A man who he needs now more than ever, not that he'd ever admit it._

He is reminded of when he was little, where he was tutored in the complete history of the fire nation among other things. _Good versus evil_ was a recurring theme in his studies. _The Seven Deadly Sins. The Nine Levels of Hell_.

He lets out a sarcastic laugh at the level of hell the scholars forgot.

_For the tenth circle of hell is for those who lie to themselves_.


	11. Salem Falls

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Salem Falls  
**Word count: **447  
**Rating**: M (I may change the rating of these drabbles up)

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**Warnings:** Rated **M** for a reason, people. IF YOU'RE UNDER AGE 14/15, THIS IS PROBABLY TOO **MATURE** FOR YOU, NO OFFENSE INTENDED.  
**Notes:** Although I don't want to change the rating on these drabbles, I care about this drabble too much to leave out. And lord is this drabble just…wow.

This is what I get from reading novels like "Salem Falls" (by Jodi Picoult) and the like. (But most especially _that_ book, especially with the _ending_, and so I name this drabble after it.) Other inspiration came from **radiantbeam**, whose fic idea also partially inspired this.

* * *

**Salem Falls**

The scalding water hits her skin with such force and heat that it is a wonder she doesn't scream out in pain. But at this point she is beyond the pain, a million miles away from her body.

But that doesn't keep her from trying. And so she scrubs mercilessly at her scalp with soap, trying to erase the dirt that will never be gone, no matter how much she tries to erase it. _Erase _it_ from memory._

The glint of a razor catches in the dim light of the shower, and she turns to it slowly. It sits there innocently enough. Her hands reach toward it and grasp its soft handle, turning it over. The new blade shines in the light, and for once her mind is mercifully blank.

She brings the razor deliberately to her skin and is preoccupied enough that she does not see the shampoo bottle fall to the ground.

The sound alone is enough to make her jump out of her skin and she whips around, her eyes flickering widely around her. She spots the shampoo bottle on the ground and slowly picks it up, putting it back in its proper place.

_Red. Blinding red and gold; colors of her nightmares. Too much red, blinding her sight immediately. Pain in ways she could never imagine. His voice, silky sweet but so devastating, words that should never be uttered coming from his deadly tongue. She only looks up the ceiling and surrenders herself._

Her mind flickers back to where she was, and she glances at her skin. The once porcelain white skin is now obscured with a cherry red blotch as bright crimson liquid quickly seeps out of a new cut.

She is mesmerized by the way the blood falls like tiny teardrops down her arm, and for a brief moment wonders if there is another way.


	12. Image

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Image  
**Warnings:** implied images  
**Word count:** 128

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**Notes:** I originally had the word _man_ as _boy_; see if that changes your perspective in any way.

* * *

**Image**

"_You're a monster," _she accuses, her cold blue eyes holding back the tears she is now beyond. Their cerulean depths hold so much pain that it is amazing he does not feel physical pain himself looking into them, and it is another wonder that he does not look away.

But something makes him hold her gaze, staring at her with regard that he finds himself time and time again granting upon her.

"_You're just like your father_," the words stopping his heart. He had always wanted to hear those words, reveled in the moment when they would be bestowed upon him.

He looks down upon the man in chains in front of him once more, his eyes hardening, and walks away.

Monster._ Yes, yes he is._


	13. A Great and Terrible Beauty

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** A Great and Terrible Beauty (013/100)  
**Word count:** _100!_

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**Warnings: **implied images**

* * *

****Notes:** This drabble literally wrote itself; I had no idea at all in the beginning but just started typing and it all came out. _(Title is copyright of __Libba Bray who wrote the novel this drabble was named after, but does not necessarily have to do with)_

* * *

**A Great and Terrible Beauty**

_We are going to die_.

Somewhere along the line, he has accepted this fact_. Maybe they won't die this minute, maybe they won't all die peacefully, but they all will die_. It is a battle that will not end without death as its price. He no longer holds onto the vain hope that they will all be alive at the end. For he knows the end will be bloody, knows that it will be gruesome, and that it will be terrible.

But it will be beautiful, _because they will win_. That is one fact he is sure of.


	14. Gone

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Gone  
**Word count:** 105  
**Warnings: **sadness D:

* * *

**Gone**

"_Is it over?" _

He looks into her face and sees among the pain, hope that it will be all over soon enough. A relief from the terrible agony that she currently in, anything to soothe what she is feeling. His heart is broken by her crushed body, and yet he can't but help wish it could be another way.

"_Almost. It'll all be alright."_ He smiles weakly and squeezes her hand, no longer sure whether he is referring to the battle or her pain.

She leaves him with one last smile before closing her beautiful eyes. _He only hopes it will be enough_.


	15. Why

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Why (015/100)  
**Author:** catalyst/fearlessgurl21/amethyststeam/catalyst283  
**Word count:** 89  
**Notes:** I almost didn't write a drabble today because of my total lack of inspiration. :o And it's only day 15!

* * *

**Why**

"What if I'm wrong?"

"…what do you mean?"

"What if it's all wrong? What if something happens and everything goes wrong? What if nothing was right to start off with? What if—"

"What if everything goes right? What if it's better than we dreamed?"

"That won't happen."

"Why?"

"…because life never ends up that way."

"What if it does? What then? Is it the end of the world because everything goes right?"

"If it's never happened that way before, why hope now?"

"_Why not?"_


	16. Innocence

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Innocence  
**Word count: **90  
**Notes:** Happy Halloween. :)

* * *

**Innocence**

They are walking through another nondescript Fire Nation town when she sees them.

Multiple children, walking, talking_, laughing._ Running from house to house, _begging for candy_. The occasion is a joyous one, something to fill their pockets with sweets and their heads with images of scary ghosts and haunted creatures.

And she can't but help stare mournfully at them. _They are just so innocent and carefree_.

And so she weeps; once for the childhood brutally robbed from her, and twice for the adulthood they will never have to face.


	17. Beginning of the End

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Beginning of the End (017/100)  
**Word count: **225 (longer than my usual :P)

* * *

**Warnings: **a la cliché, possibly.  
**Notes:** This was not written to be a pairing, but somehow it turned out that way. DON'T MAKE IT THAT WAY please. D: Try to think of it as friendly as possible, k?

Drat. I meant to keep this as general as possible until drabble 50. ;;' (friendly, got that? Character redemption here, not romance ;;;')

* * *

**Beginning of the End**

He faints.

It isn't much of a beginning, not much of an end either, but it is _his_ life and thus he doesn't expect much more than that. Through one slip in mentality he _missed_, and now he is paying for it. _In blood, no less_, but it is more than that. He has _finally _given up, and in that he has finally _won_. (It didn't make much sense to him before either, but he finally gets it now)

He does not fight the pain, but the nagging thought of a presence watching him makes him struggle to regain consciousness.

Her bright blue eyes are the first things he sees among the wavering images and he can't but help laugh. _If this isn't irony, he doesn't know what is._

"You're too…late…it's…over…peasant," he manages to choke out, a sad hint of a smile with the last word.

"I can help, Zuko." _When has he heard_ those_ words before?_

"You're not going to die. It's not the end." The images swirl before his eyes and he tries to shake them still, wishing to retain one still image before it all fades to black.

"I can help you," She is persistent. "Let me help."

"Heal me," he murmurs, a cry, a promise, _a beginning_.


	18. Blessing

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Blessing (018/100)  
**Word count**: 149  
**Notes:** Spoilers for the episode, "The Runaway"

* * *

**Blessing**

_I can't even remember my own mother's face_.

Imagine that. After all the years that passed, after all the _pain_, I can't see her face. The beautiful long black hair remains, but I can't make out her nose, her mouth, her _eyes_. I know the colors, I know how she lives on through us; but I can't remember _her_.

Instead, I see my sister's face. The laughing (sometimes stern) but always _strong _face that I have come to associate with a mother. My true mother has died years ago, the one without a face. My sister is younger than me, and she is just a child to many, but she is strong. She is the mother to our little group, the one who always holds us together when we can longer keep ourselves from falling to pieces.

_And for that I'm grateful._


	19. Because

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Because  
**Rating**: T (because of implications)  
**Word count**: 91  
**Notes:** This is Zuko's reaction to Mai in my friend **radiantbeam's** new fanfic, Shattered (drabble written as a request by her), but can be thought of openly if you choose. :)

I hope I got the characterization right. XD

* * *

**Because**

_How did this happen?_

How the _hell _did this happen? How can I be talking to her, speaking her name, and have her not respond? How can she be like this? What kind of torture has she gone through, what kind of hell has that _bastard _put her through that has made her like this?

And in that I have my answer. An answer that lately has become an answer to _everything_, everything I'd never thought it would be the answer to and is all the same.

Because of _him_.


	20. Late

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Late (**20**/100)  
**Author:** catalyst/fearlessgurl21/amethyststeam/catalyst283  
**Word count**: 105  
**Notes:** This was another drabble that wrote itself, the ending not what I had thought of in the beginning. (Though that was not necessarily a bad thing XD)

And woot! I'm **1/5** of the way done now. XD

* * *

**Late**

_I wasn't there._

The water fell hard onto her skin, the sharp reminder of the last time it had rained. But she continued walking, slowly approaching her destination. She felt herself cringing with every step, but resisted the urge to stop where she was. She was almost there. The rain fell harder, the wind whipping her thick hair into her face. And then she stopped. The grave was new, the earth yielding to her feet.

And when she fell to the ground sobbing, she could almost hear his voice, almost feel his cheery laugh surrounding her.

"I'm so sorry, Aang."

_To save you._


	21. Terror

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Terror (021/100)  
**Word count**: 80  
**Notes:** I was looking at prompts on a community at LJ for ideas when I saw this one that stood out to me. I'd love for it to be the title of this drabble, but it'd give too much away. XD

* * *

**Terror**

_This isn't happening._

She grasped his pale face in her hands and felt the liquid fall like sand, half dropping quickly through her fingers and the other half sticking to her skin. And like its comparative substance, the blood made her feel like she would never be clean again.

_Not today. Not to him. Not to me. Not to the world._

And so she brought her hands to her face and wept, the crimson liquid forever staining her face.


	22. Pure

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Pure (022/100)  
**Word count**: 66  
**Notes:** Listening to the "Beauty and the Beast" soundtrack, this came to mind. Not what you'd expect.

* * *

**Pure**

Her eyes pleaded with him, their once hopeful depths empty to the point of despair. And yet he could see she had one bit of hope left, that part of her begging for a life that was not hers.

_I'd do anything._

The implication is not lost. For_ him_, the soul entwined with hers since the beginning.

_Please._

How foolish he was to think otherwise.


	23. Infinite

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Infinite (023/100)  
**Word count**: 58  
**Notes:** Inspiration from "Chasing Cars" by Snow Patrol, because that is about one of the best songs out there.

* * *

**Infinite**

_I love you_.

Three words that had a thousand meanings, three small words that meant more than anyone could know. Words that were so overused, but so many times left unsaid all the same. Words he knew that some had all the chances in the world to say, but never did.

_Words that he never knew he would be saying._


	24. Timeless

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Timeless (024/100)  
**Word count:** 218**

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Notes:** I just finished watching _Beauty and the Beast_. So sad, but so sweet and beautiful. _Tale as old as time_…

* * *

**Timeless**

_You came back.  
_  
His beautiful gold eyes roll up toward hers, weary and tired but lovely all the same. She is leaning forward over him, shaking her head sadly. They are finally together, and time is not on their side.

_Of course I came back._

She softly grabs his arm, bringing his hand to her cheek. She watches his face with despair, trying to forever capture this moment in her mind. _The way his eyes were almost shut, the way the rain fell upon his face. How the scar across his eye was illuminated every so often by the passing lightning_. He then opens his mouth to speak, and the weakness in his voice nearly breaks her heart.

_At least I got to see you…one last time._

He just can't do this to her, just can't. It's not going to happen to him, to _them_. He's going tolive. _This isn't the end_. She is about to reassure him of this when suddenly she sees his head falling backward, his hand going limp in hers.

_Please. Please don't leave me_.

The words whisper from her mouth, and a silent tear trickles down her cheek. She falls over his lifeless body, on a place very near his heart.

_I love you, Zuko._


	25. Power

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Power (025/100)  
**Word count:** 249  
**Warnings: **spoilers for "The Puppetmaster"

* * *

**Notes:** These are (10) one-sentence claims that form the story of tonight's episode.(And now I'm ¼ of the way done with my drabbles. XD)

* * *

**Power**

_Comfort_…The old woman lost in the world of red finds blue again and thinks, _just maybe_, there is hope.

_Soft_…Her tone is soft and familiar, and so _mother-like_ that the young waterbender can't but help lowering her defenses once more; _this time will be different._

_Innocence_…Old eyes meet young and she knows that though the girl has felt much, she still has a lot to learn.

_Fear_…The woman turns away only for a second before sharp gray eyes meet the blue ones once more, goosebumps running down the younger's arm.

_Wind_…The air is still only for a second before it starts; the battle between two masters.

_Speed_…A flash and the girl sees with shock that though the woman is old, she moves with the timeless grace and velocity of someone much younger.

_Confusion_…Her friends step into the scene mid-battle and surprise flickers on their faces for only a second before they cede control of their bodies.

_Pain_…She feels her strength failing with every second that passes when suddenly her eyes fall downward at the grass and finds grim resolve; _it's the only way_.

_Forever_…The moon has never been fuller, but she cannot but help feeling _empty_, sick with repulsion at the power she has been presented with.

_Breaking_…Good and evil have faded away into the merciless gray that she sees now, and knows with certainty the weight of the lesson she has been taught.


	26. Breathe

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Breathe (026/100)  
**Word count:** 88  
**Notes:** Another idea similar to (and at the same time different from) drabble #4 of mine, _Truth and Lies_.

* * *

**Breathe**

_She was right, of course, but it still hurt._ Tears don't course down her face as most people would expect; she isn't heartbroken and remorseful, but rather…just a bit sad. It passes quickly and she's her normal conniving self again, as if nothing happened. You'd have to know Azula as long as I have to see the change, but it was there all the same.

_And in that you've shown yourself to be just as human as the rest of us, Azula_.


	27. The Reason

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** The Reason (027/100)  
**Word count:** 109  
**Notes:** This drabble completely did not end off the way I planned it; I originally had another character as the main one being described in this drabble; but as I came back to finish writing the drabble I changed it while writing, the idea coming to me and not leaving me alone. :3

(And if for those of you who have seen the episode, if you think about it, it has some ideas used from "Day of Black Sun," though this didn't actually happen in the episode)

* * *

**The Reason**

The fire rises like a curtain and the scene is set, the roles each of them are to play set in place before them. Black and white, good and evil. She is in her place, her role one she has been playing since birth. And a little voice whispers in her head, _but is it enough? Will winning be enough? Will it be __right?_

And it is this little seed of doubt implanted in her mind that causes what happens next, an ending unforeseen by anyone.

She says only three words _(For you, Zuko)_ before running to take his place, the lightning passing through her heart instead.

"_No, Mai!"_


	28. Compromise

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Compromise (028/100)  
**Author:** catalyst283  
**Word count:** 318 (quite long compared to my usual XD)  
**Notes:** This was written as a certain pairing, but I left it as open as I could for you to decide the characters. :) And the idea itself is so sweet and beautiful that you could take out some of the ideas of nations here and there and make it whoever you want it be.

* * *

**Compromise**

The fabric of the dress caught on her nails as she fingered it impatiently, the gold material glinting in the light. Her eyes flickered down to it, eyes brushing over the intricate details of the cloth. It was, as they say, 'fit for a queen'. _And it was about the worst thing she had ever worn._ She was, of course, careful to keep the disgust out of her voice, it being part of the compromise they had come to. _More like torture,_ she thought with a grimace She was just about to glance around for someone (to ask what the hell she'd gotten herself into) when the music started, her cue to start the walk that signified the beginning of her new life.

_It was time_.

And when the doors opened, it was like all the doubts and uncertainties had never been there, the instant his eyes met hers. It was not like all the fairytales she had been read to as a child, where their eyes met and her breath caught and it was a gaze of enchanting passion. Neither was it like her parents' wedding, one she had been told was nothing about love and everything about power and uniting the wealthy Fire Nation families.

No, it was much _better _than all that, his bright eyes shining with happiness and a tad bit of humor and nervousness thrown in, something that made her smirk and laugh joyfully inside. He was not perfect and neither was she, but they were here to become united in something she had never thought possible, something so cliché and overwritten that it was almost a gag anymore.

_They were coming together in love, and that took all the compromise in the world to make work._

But his soft eyes met hers in a gaze of undying devotion and she knew it was all worth it, even the terrible gold dress.


	29. Lies

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Lies (029/100)  
**Author:** catalyst283  
**Word count:** 163  
**Notes:** More ideas from "The Beach," this time with a character I hadn't a chance to explore the thoughts and actions of before.

* * *

**Lies**

_What do you want from me? You want a teary confession about how hard my childhood was? Well it wasn't. I was a rich, only-child who got anything I wanted...as long as I behaved...and sat still...and didn't speak unless spoken to._

I got everything I wanted…but was it enough? Everything I wanted and more…for a price. Everything, and yet it was nothing, nothing more than a bunch of lies in the end, nothing more than a bunch of junk. And look where it's gotten me. _Look who I've become_.

He's right I_ am_ a big blah—a big blah of hidden feelings and wants that will rarely see the light (if ever), a person with a constant mask on her face. Our little group, well, we've all got our masks, our own secrets, but now all it's doing is tearing us apart.

_When wanting the world, I never wanted this_.


	30. Illusion

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Illusion (30/100)  
**Word count:** 146  
**Notes:** After this drabble, this drabble set will be on a **MINI-HIATUS** until Sunday (11/18) because I'm going to be on a weekend retreat. (Without internet; but even if it had it I'd still put this hiatus in order because the retreat's all for rest and relaxation and without obligations, as interesting as this all is to do. :3)

* * *

**Illusion**

She should have known.

The instant the life was sucked out of the beautiful flowers right in front of her, the moment the old woman said, "They're just flowers," as if the plants meant very little at all. _She should have known_.

But she didn't. She was innocent or naïve or just plain fooling herself, wishing the old woman to be someone she wasn't. Wishing to cling to that bit of her past, her culture; things that were so often ripped from her.

She should have known that it was just an illusion, just another thing to get her hopes up just for them to be dashed. _Again and again_. She should have known the woman was not at all who she seemed to be, not at all in her right mind.

But she didn't. _And she hated herself for it._


	31. Heart

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Heart (031/100)  
**Word count:** 136  
**Notes:** This was inspired by a friend's monologue (personal speech about events in their life) at my weekend retreat. Theirs was on their dad, but I feel that this can apply to many situations and most definitely some of the mommy issues we have in Avatar.

* * *

**Heart**

_But at the end of the day, I wanted my mom back. I wanted her to tuck me in bed, tell me she loved me and would always be there for me. I wanted her to smile at me, her bright blue eyes shining, and say that she'd protect me from the whole wide world. Saying it'd always be alright._

I wanted that for a long time. I _still _want it. I still want her to be here with me, to guide me, to laugh with me, to _love_ me. I need her so badly that it hurts; a pain that I don't think will ever go away. She'll always be with me in my heart, I know that, but it just doesn't seem to be enough.

Mommy, I miss you.


	32. Wanted

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Wanted (032/100)  
**Word count:** 129  
**Notes:** Inspired by "All We Know" by Paramore, and a little bit by "All At Once" by The Fray.

* * *

**Wanted**

_I was the perfect prince, the son my father always wanted………but I wasn't me._

Who am I? It's a question I've been asking myself for as long as I can remember, but only now have I been able to piece together an answer to the question, an answer I can live with. Before I always used to think that if I was the perfect Prince of the Fire Nation, if I thought and acted the part; my father would be proud of me. I thought he'd love me. I thought that was_ me._

But I was wrong. That's not who I am, not who I'll ever be. And with that realization I finally know something else.

_It isn't my destiny either._


	33. Words

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Words (033/100)  
**Word count:** 302  
**Notes:** More ideas on a specific character; I was trying for a prompt at avatarcontest, but it didn't exactly work out. That's alright, though, because I'm kind of interested in how this turned out…

* * *

**Words**

Her eager face peeks out from behind the curtain, the maliciousness belonging on a face much older. She feels her brother beneath her, watching the same spectacle with much less eager eyes. Any other time she would feel the fear coming off his body in waves, but right now she is too interested in the scene in front of her. And a most interesting scene it is.

_Father, revoke Iroh's birthright. I am your humble servant, here to serve you and our nation. Use me._

Her ears can scarcely hear one thing before something else invades, a new piece of the verbal war between the two men in the front of the room. She is a child, but her ears and eyes have shown her things beyond her age. She knows much more than her brother would ever dream to know, knows much more than her mother could ever think she did. Things are escalating quickly, and so she watches the scene with anticipation. Her grandfather speaks again, and she can feel her brother trembling beneath her, the curtain slightly swaying.

_I think Iroh has suffered enough. But you, your punishment has scarcely begun!_

And the curtain flutters, her brother running off in the other direction in quite a hurry. She smirks at him before turning back to the scene before her, partially glad she doesn't have to share it with anyone else anymore. In any case, her brother definitely isn't the courageous one; she doesn't need anyone to tell her that.

_You must know the pain of losing a first born son, by sacrificing your own._

She'll be back to tell her brother what she heard, for sure, but that doesn't mean he's going get all the details. _He'd never believe her, anyway_.


	34. Lived

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Lived (034/100)  
**Word count:** 180  
**Notes:** As some can probably tell, I'm going back into old episodes and using old quotes to emphasis new points found in the new season three episodes, bringing everything full circle.

* * *

**Lived**

_Some people believe that the Avatar was never reborn into the Air Nomads and that the cycle is broken, but I haven't lost hope. I still believe that somehow the Avatar will return to save the world._

One day I'll be able to say that because of my hope, all was not lost. One day I'll be able to look at the past with joy and fondness at all the beautiful memories. One day I'll be happy—we'll all be happy. The world will be at peace once again. I know this to be true. I know it because every time I look into his eyes I can see my own dream reflected in them, I can see his love for the world shining upon us all.

And every time I start to lose hope, I only have to look into his eyes to feel safe again, to hope again.

Today has finally dawned—_this is the day, this is it_. And when I pull on my old clothes again, I remind myself.

_To believe._


	35. Forget

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Forget (035/100)  
**Word count:** 74  
**Notes:** This came out of nowhere; it just literally wrote itself and I'm _still_ looking at the page blankly. XD (This is also quite different from what I usually write…and yet somewhat the same. ')

* * *

**Forget**

If only…

"_I can't do this," and just like that her hand falls away from his face, her gaze falling to the ground._

"_I can't be hurt again, I won't let m—I just won't!" And he understands._

"_I know," That's why they're here._

_The silence stretches on as the green crystals glimmer in the shadows, reminders of something they have not quite forgotten._

…things were different back then.


	36. Lost and Found

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title:** Lost and Found (036/100) **Word count:** 174  
**Warnings:** **post**-"Nightmares and Daydreams"but **before DoBS****  
****Notes:** I do love tying in old episodes with new ones. :3 Also, with this drabble I'll be going on a **mini-hiatus** again (sorry D:) until **Monday (11/26)**, this time my family and I are going on a little mini-vacation to the Dells where I'll again be without computer/internet. (But not without pen or paper, I may have a chance to write some things during the long car-ride…)

* * *

**Lost and Found**

_That's who you are, Zuko. Someone who keeps fighting even though it's hard._

The words echo in his head, coming back to him once again. He sees her face so clearly, smiling and laughing, so _real_ that he almost feels that he can reach out and touch her. This is not the first time he has seen her like this, and it certainly won't be the last.

But something has changed since the last time (_the time when he found out how truly hated the fire nation was),_ something he can feel deep inside of him. He has been fighting—_fighting with himself._ Fighting to figure out who he was, who he is _Who he will become_.

Finally, among all the confusion, he has found his center. He has finally found his peace. He has finally found what he was he was looking for. _He's finally found himself_.

And all he can think of is his mother. _If only you were here, Mom. If only you could see me now._


	37. Existence

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Existence (037/100)  
**Word count:** 152**  
****Notes:** As much as people say "The Beach" was a terrible fanfic written into the show, it was cringe-worthy, ect…I still think some of the quotes from it are worth going into more. :3

* * *

**Existence**

_I don't have sob stories like all of you. I could sit here and complain how our mom liked Zuko more than me, but I don't really care._

I don't care—not at all. I could care less what she thought of me; could care less that she liked my brother more than me, thought that I was a_ monster…_it really doesn't matter anymore anyway. She's gone—long gone, and Father's opinion is enough for the both of them…I tell myself this even now, repeating it in my mind over and over again to the point where that little ounce of doubt I had is tiny enough to not be there at all.

And yet, it's still there. _Always there, just waiting…waiting for the day when this tangled web of lies I've spun finally begins to unravel and fall to pieces…_


	38. Time

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles **Chapter Title: **Time (038/100)  
**Word count:** 155**  
****Notes:** I'm skipping around the episodes of Avatar, looking for inspiration, before DoBS finally airs and I can finally use it for all the inspiration it brings. :3

* * *

**Time**

_I just asked if you were cold. I didn't ask for your whole life story._

Because I already know it.

Not all of it—not these last three years—but everything else. I know who you are Zuko, more than you know yourself. And even though these last three years seem to have changed you so much, you're the guy you were back before everything happened. Before the Agni Kai, before your banishment. _Before everything_.

You've gone full circle, Zuko. And you've gained new knowledge along the way, seen and learned things I can't even imagine. And this is how I know there isn't much I can do for you if you don't help yourself now.

I'm here for you, Zuko; I'm here to support you and to love you. We can support _each other_ now.

_It's time for you to take the first step._


	39. Life

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Life (039/100)  
**Word count:** 210 **Warnings: **harshness on the part of one character at the end, maybe, depending on how you view it**  
****Notes:** I had an emotional day, and it very much helped me to write Ty Lee today. :3

* * *

**Life**

_Do you have any idea what my home life was like, growing up with six sisters who look exactly like me? __It was like I didn't even have my own name. I joined the circus because I was scared of spending the rest of my life as part of a matched set. _

All my life I've gone out of my way to be different, to not be a clone of six other people. Being myself wasn't being _me_—I was a replica of one or more of my sisters. And I've finally achieved that difference, that uniqueness that I'd craved forever—and it's not enough.

Well, what's your excuse, Mai?_ You were an only child for 15 years, but even with all that attention, your aura is this dingy, pasty, gray._

I'm jealous of you, Mai. I'm jealous of the life you had—one where you were not a clone of six other girls, did not have to worry about being lost in the crowd or being ignored completely. You had everything—_everything_, _Mai!—_and look where it got you.

I guess I can say that as much I've always wanted your life; I've never wanted to be _you_.


	40. Fight

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Fight (040/100)  
**Word count:** 132 **Rating**: G **Warnings: **none**  
****Notes:** I really need to write Aang more. :P

* * *

**Fight**

_I can't just stand by and do nothing!_

I can't just watch as a fight goes on without me, a fight that _wouldn't_ have happened if things had gone differently at Ba Sing Se. I just can't watch passively while everyone else—_everyone I care about_—is in the middle of this_, fighting_. It doesn't even matter if it's this fight or another one _(the final battle, even_); it matters not that everyone in the world thinks I'm dead and helping will ruin my cover—I'm not just going to stand by and let this happen.

I'm the Avatar.

My responsibility—my _life_—is to bring peace back to the world. And I'm going to do it, even if it kills me.


	41. Enough

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Enough (041/100)** Word count: **111  
**Rating**: G **Warnings: **more Zuko angst, sorry D:**  
****Notes:** Thank you so much to **JillRG** at for giving me my 100th review. :3

* * *

**Enough**

_I have changed._

But not enough. Not enough to be the person you want me to be. The person I should have been had my life been different; had I done things differently, said things differently.

_Because I'm confused. Because I'm not sure I know the difference between right and wrong anymore._

The line has blurred and the crisp differences between black and white are no longer. All I can see anymore is a dull gray and it's spinning around me, a dense fog of confusion.

_I'm angry at myself!_

For not doing the right thing. For not changing _enough_.

But mostly, _for who I'm not_.


	42. Finale

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Finale (042/100)** Word count:** 322  
**Warnings**: _**DoBS spoilers like whoa**_**  
****Notes:** I have so much more to write on Zuko. _So much more_. You have given me so much in this episode Zuko, _so so much to work with_. :3

* * *

**Finale**

_I thought it was honor that I wanted, but really, I was just trying to please you. You, my father, who banished me, just for talking out of turn. My father, who challenged me, a 13 year old boy to an Agni Kai. How could you justify a duel with a child?_

You can't_. Not at all_. It wasn't right; it wasn't to teach me respect—it was _cruel_ and it was _wrong_. Not even my father—my birth father, anyway—can justify it, as much as he tries.

_I've learned everything! And I've had to learn it on my own!_

All on my own; without a mother to help me or my biological father to support me. No, I had to do it the hard way—_learn_ it the hard way—making so many mistakes along the way_ that hurt so damn much_. I kept thinking it was about me, _always_ thinking it was about how much I lacked in my father's eyes and my _honor_ that I never realized all the people I was hurting in the process, never stopping to_ think_ how much they tried to help me or show me kindness, things I didn't _deserve_.

But I've finally learned. _Finally._

_After I leave here today, I'm going to free Uncle Iroh from his prison and I'm going beg for his forgiveness. He's the one who's been a real father to me.  
_

Spirits, if only he will_ look_ at me, much less forgive me. I've done so much to him—I can't honestly see him forgiving me. But I'm going to try; I'm going to hell as try.

_But I've come to an even more important decision. I'm going to join the Avatar, and I'm going to help him defeat you._

My eyes have finally opened, and this is goodbye.


	43. Price

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Price (043/100) **Word count:** 244**  
****Notes:** As you can see, I'm using ASN's transcripts to drag up inspiration for my drabbles; I use a new transcript the instant it appears at ASN.

* * *

**Price**

_Can you feel the power the full moon brings? __For generations, it has blessed Waterbenders with its glow, allowing us to do incredible things._

Things beyond a person's wildest imagination…things she would have never thought _possible_ until there was nothing else, until she had no choice but to _try_ the impossible.

She knows the instant she hits rock bottom that she'll have to claw her way back up to the top—claw over others if necessary; whatever she has to do to get back up, to bring herself back to being _human_. She has been reduced to less than the rats in her cage—rats that have the ability to escape from the walls around her, a freedom she herself has not.

_Not yet, anyway_. She has lost many things in the prison (_beauty, clothes, time, sanity_) but one thing she has not lost is her determination, something that acts in spite of her loss of hope. She will get out of there, she _will_.

The moon brings her new strength, it brings her _power_. She feels her bending powers at their peak and she knows escaping is no longer impossible. It is probable, it is _imminent_.

The guard hits the floor as easily as the rats and she feels a self-satisfied smirk come across her face. He is nothing but an obstacle, after all.

Everything comes with a price—and this is one the woman is willing to pay.


	44. Truth

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Truth (044/100) **Word count:** 203 **  
****Notes:** Still have plenty of ideas from DoBS. :3

* * *

**Truth**

_Growing up, we were taught that the Fire Nation was the greatest civilization in history, and somehow, the war was our way of sharing our greatness with the rest of the world._

We were to help show them our methods, our ideas, our ways of life. We were going to help build the other nations up to the point of greatness, to share what we had with everyone else. We were supposed to be _helping_ the other nations.

_What an amazing lie that was! The people of the world are terrified of the Fire Nation!_ _They don't see our greatness...they hate us!_

The irony of it all is astounding, but what is even more astounding is that it's taken this long for anyone to see it—we've been in the war for over a hundred years and yet so many people still think the same things they thought a _century_ ago.

_And we deserve it. We've created an era of fear in the world, and if we don't want the world to destroy itself, we need to replace it with an era of peace and kindness._

After a century of lies, it's time for the truth.


	45. Pain

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles **Chapter Title**: Pain (045/100)  
**Word count:** 228 **Rating**: PG **Warnings:** just implications **Notes**: Still chugging along, creating these drabbles and connecting the past to the present. ;)

* * *

**Pain**

_Your future is full of struggle and anguish, most of it self-inflicted._

And that's not even the half of it. For all of what I said about that nonsense called fortunetelling...each and every one of her predictions has come true. Not enough to make me believe before, but now...I don't know what to say; _what_ to believe.

_My life will be calm, and happy and joyful!_

And the two girls I love will die very rapid (and possibly very painful) deaths, very near to right after one another.

I mean, come on; is it a jinx? Am I cursed or something, to have every women I've ever been close to die a quick death...right after I become to care about them so much? I could even say that it started with my mother; as much as I was closer to my dad...you only have one mother.

...she was the first, next Yue, and now..._Suki, oh Spirits_. It's just so hard to think about...so unbelievably hard to believe she's gone...but I just can't think she's alive, only for my hopes to be crushed later...

I've always bragged about being such a great warrior...but I've never been able to do the one thing that matters the most.

_Save the ones I love._


	46. Almost

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Almost (046/100) **Word count: **267 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: implied images **  
****Notes:** Written as I was listening to "So Close" by Jon McLaughlin (from the _Enchanted_ soundtrack) Ehh, I was going somewhere else with this drabble (like possibly trying to make it 100 words as well XP), but as usual, it wrote itself and led away from what I had initially decided to write…

* * *

**Almost**

_I thought you had changed!_

I thought things were going to be _different_ for once. I thought I was finally seeing a side (_the good side_) of the banished Prince I had never seen before. I thought, after all this_ fighting_, that we were finally connecting. _I thought we had something in common_.

I thought a lot of things—but now, all I'm thinking is that I was a fool to believe you.

_I just used the spirit water from the North Pole. I don't know what I did, exactly._

I saved the water for something special; that's what I did. I saved Aang's life. _I saved the Avatar._

It's not hard to believe this when I see his smiling face near mine every day. And when our relationship is taken to a new level, I'm floating on air. It could've been the last time I saw him, but it wasn't. We both lived to die another day.

It's not hard to keep saying, _I did the right thing_, when I know I did. The Avatar is alive, and he is all the hope in the world; all that _I _ever need to keep going.

It's not hard (_not hard at all_) to forget you.

_It is only my nightmares that tell a different story. And as I wake every morning from the same (oh so same) scene, I feel the words falling off my lips as my eyelids reflect that familiar place, the one where you and I almost had something._

_I could've saved you._


	47. Listen

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Listen (047/100)  
**Word count: **_100! _**Warnings**: implied images (seriously) **  
****Notes:** Something I (and others) have been pondering for awhile…

* * *

_Everything is connected…_

* * *

He's never told her.

Not that it would frighten her, not that it would do anything but get a laugh and a "Whatever you say, Twinkle Toes," from her. Not that it would make her more careful or less _Toph_. Not that it would make any difference to her at all. _Not that she would believe him_. And that is what scares him the most.

_And then I had a vision in a magic swamp and—_

He's never told her…and she's never asked.

_Time is an illusion and so is death, after all._


	48. Everything

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Everything (048/100)  
**Word count: **266 **Rating**: G**  
****Notes:** Oh do I love to connect all three seasons. XD

* * *

**Everything**

"_I'm sorry, Mai,"_ _he says, murmuring three words that don't even begin to make up for what he has done to her; what he will do to her when everything is said and done. _

The note isn't enough, he knows. It won't tell her she's done nothing wrong _(it's him, it's always him_), it won't tell her when or where she'll see him again, much less how much he will have _changed_ by then. Spirits, it won't even tell her exactly whyhe's leaving—he's only just figured this out for himself, after all, and he can't even conceive how to tell her—there's just too much to say, and not enough time to explain it all.

All the note will tell her is that he's gone; something she'd figure out for herself easily enough. It'll tell her they've chosen different paths (_no matter how much she had thought they had chosen the same_), and that she shouldn't be surprised if they meet again on different sides.

He never thought it would come to this. _If things were different_…but no, they're not, and he knows he cannot dwell on the past anymore. That's what got him into this mess in the first place, way back when he had his first chance to change. (_Well, look at this—enemies and traitors all working together_)

He just can't have it all.

"_Goodbye," he whispers, soft enough to wonder if he's said it at all._


	49. Responsibility

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Responsibility (049/100)  
**Word count: **189**  
****Notes: **This drabble is set post-DoBS. (Also, there are minute references to the end of Death Note; or rather, Light's way of thinking about his "responsibility"…)

* * *

**Responsibility**

_Why didn't you tell us you were the Avatar?__  
__Because... I never wanted to be._

And it's times like these when I'm yet again faced with the harsh reality of the world, the reality of my position, my _life_. I had no choice in the whole Avatar business and yet I've had to accept the huge responsibility being the Avatar brings all the same. I've been through so many trials…so many _failures,_ so many _deaths _(_even my own_)…I just can't see why I was the right one. The right airbender_. The right person to become the Avatar_.

There are so many times when I wonder if things had been different…if I had been born just a regular airbender, a regular air nomad like the rest of my people. And then I get to realizing that if things were different…_I'd be dead_.

And I start thinking, maybe things were meant to be this way. Maybe I am the right person for the job, the responsibility, the life.

Someone has to do it. _Maybe I'm the only who can._


	50. Strength

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Strength (0**50**/100)  
**Word count: **408 (quite longer than my usual XD) **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes: **DRABBLE **50** AND HALFWAY DONE, WOOT :D As for notes on the piece, I just got this idea from the ritual you sometimes see being done by people in churches, something that will make more sense when you read the drabble itself. :3

* * *

**Strength**

The darkness of the sanctuary is punctured suddenly by a small flame, a candle burning in the darkness. The candle flickers with light; the new flame wavering in the darkness. The flame burns bright and the wax drips down the sides, coming to pool at the bottom of the candle on the wood table. _Look, I appreciate the effort, but the fact is each of you is __so__ amazing and __so __special, and I'm not. I'm just the guy in the group who's regular._

There is a moment of silence before a ghost hand grabs the first candle, bringing it to a second candle and lighting that one as well. The second candle burns brighter before flickering, seeming to die before the watching eyes. The hand brings the first candle to the second again, bringing the flame closer and encouraging the second wick to light. _I'm not going to make it. I failed_. _Everyone thinks I'm dead again. They think I've abandoned them, and I'm losing this war. I'm letting the whole world down._

A third candle is lit, and a fourth and a fifth, and soon the room is blazing with light. _My parents don't understand. They've always treated me like I was helpless…I love you more than anything. You and your brother are my entire world. I thought about you every day I was gone, and every night when I went to sleep. I would lay awake missing you so much, it would ache…There's no time. Just go. We'll take care of him. He's our leader_…

The hand takes the sixth candle before pausing on the seventh one, hesitating; _remembering_. After a brief pause, the soft hand grabs the candle (_tightly_) and lights it as well. _You've got to get out of here! I'll hold them off as long as I can!…_ _I used to think this scar marked me. The mark of the banished prince, cursed to chase the Avatar forever. But lately, I've realized I'm free to determine my own destiny, even if I'll never be free of my mark_…

"There is always hope," the phantom murmurs, watching the lit candles dance a moment before exiting the sanctuary as quietly as she entered it, a piece of blue cloth caught in the floor the only other sign that she had been there at all.


	51. The Avatar Returns

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Avatar Returns (051/100)  
**Word count:** 126 **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes: **I've decided that drabbles 51-100 will each be a drabble for each episode (or two-part episode) of Avatar. If you count this drabble for both episodes 1 and 2 (cause they're really two parts of one "chapter") and all the similar two-part episodes (The Desert/The Library, Siege of The North Part I and II, ect.), I'll be able to _almost_ get to the end of Avatar, maybe even to the last episode if I count all four of the last episodes of season 3 as the one big season finale, like they're supposedly going to be in the show…

Also, just because I'm doing a drabble for an episode in season one or two does not mean I won't connect it to the current episode(s). :3

* * *

**The Avatar Returns**

_Giant light beams...flying bison...Airbenders...I think I've got Midnight Sun Madness. I'm going home to where stuff makes sense._

Too bad nothing makes sense anymore. I should've known that day would change everything, should've known that nothing would ever be the same. _It was fate_, my sister would say. She would go on and on about how it was _destiny_ that we were in that spot at that exact moment. She, the one who has all the hope in the world for the future, would believe it was a miracle.

_I'm just a guy with a boomerang; I didn't ask for all this flying and magic._

I didn't ask for it, but I got it all anyway.


	52. The Southern Air Temple

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Southern Air Temple (052/100)  
**Word count: **191 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: implied images**  
****Notes: **I see very few fics from the perspective of this character (heck, I myself have not written him before XD) and so I was very hesitative when writing this drabble, wondering if I'm writing him right and all…

* * *

**The Southern Air Temple**

_But Gyatso, how do I know if I'm ready for this?_

Aang, my ever-questioning pupil; a boy filled with much happiness and joy and so incredibly full of_ life_. Silly and loveable, sweet but naïve. At twelve, he is still Aang, _just Aang_. But one day he will become much _more_ than that, will have a responsibility and fate so great…so great that sometimes I wonder if there has been a mistake, if they have the wrong boy, if there is another way_…_

To take all of what he is away from him; to force another identity upon him at the age of twelve, not even a teenager yet…I worry deeply for him. Already so much has been taken from him, so much has _changed._ Nothing will ever be the same in his life.

_Upon first glance, you could never tell that this young airbender will one day become the Avatar, the master of all elements and the one who holds the fate of the world in his hands._

But I know, deep inside, it is right. He is the one. _He will save the world_.


	53. The Warriors of Kyoshi

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Warriors of Kyoshi (053/100)  
**Word count: **120 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: just against a particular relationship if you dislike it**  
****Notes**: I'm not sure if I like this pairing or not, but it was in the episode and it was an interesting turning point in Sokka's life so I felt it necessary to put in this drabble. :3

_**EDIT:** Sorry guys, was acting up last night and thus why I couldn't post the drabble last night. I'll post today's in a little bit and you'll have a two for one deal. :3_

* * *

**The Warriors of Kyoshi**

_There's no time to say goodbye. _There's no time to say all the things I need to say to you, all the things I should have said to you the first time I met you. No time to say all the things I should have said the first time you insulted me, the first time you fell down on the floor in humiliation and painful defeat_. The first time you kneeled before me and admitted humble surrender,_ _the first time you looked at me and knew me_.

Time just always seems to be scarce in the moments we need it most.

_I am a warrior. But I'm a girl, too._

And I'll never forget you.


	54. The King of Omashu

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The King of Omashu (054/100)  
**Word count: **266 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: implied images **  
****Notes**: This, being such a joke filled episode, was hard to make into a drabble. XD I'm just not good at being funny on purpose, and making a serious drabble from this episode was rather challenging. XP Now that I've finished, though, I can see that this is actually quite long. I guess once I started writing, I just couldn't stop. XD (And I'm sorry that this drabble has little to do with this episode but the quotes and how Aang relates to them. XP)

_**EDITEDIT: **__This drabble contains__** s1! quotes with s3!Aang, **__just to let you know. There was confusion on how Aang would know Azula at this point, which he wouldn't; unless he's s3!Aang, if that makes sense. XD_

* * *

**The King of Omashu**

_Typical airbender tactic: avoid and evade. I'd hoped the Avatar would be less predictable._

When I was growing up, we were raised in the air temples to use peaceful methods to solve conflict instead of violence. We were to not hurt our opponent, but to direct their attacks away from ourselves or avoid their attacks entirely. We were basically taught to avoid fighting at all costs, using everything in our power to avoid conflict in general.

War was unheard of in our temples. After all, we weren't about to fight.

Or fight back.

_Don't you have any surprises for me? Sooner or later, you'll have to strike back._

It's come down to this; it's come down to the fact that if we don't fight, we will die.

The Fire Nation wasted no time exterminating my people; they will waste no time destroying everyone and everything I love if I surrender; if we don't fight, if I don't fight the Fire Lord. He will waste no time destroying the rest of the world, waste no time exterminating everyone across the earth until only he is the only one left.

For it'll never be enough for him. Nothing will ever be enough to make him happy, to believe he's won. _Nothing; never._ I can see this as clearly as I can see the scar on Zuko's face and the blue fire coursing from his sister's fingertips, the blatant images of what has happened to the peace in this world.

_It's come down to this._


	55. Imprisoned

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Imprisoned (055/100) **Word count: **223 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: implied images **  
****Notes**: Oh bugger, this is probably one of the hardest episodes to write a drabble from; but I gave it my best shot. XP Again I am writing from a perspective I have not yet before, though I tried so hard to write something from Katara's perspective. XD (Tried, but failed; my hands typed against my will and changed this drabble into something different and yet somewhat similar to what I've written before…)

The setting/time should be apparent, but if it's not I'll tell you it's during this particular episode, in season 1. (It's not beyond the middle of the episode)

* * *

**Imprisoned**

_Some of you may think that the Fire Nation has made you powerless._

More powerless than you will ever know, Katara. You don't know how it feels to have your bending taken away from you—to have to rip off a part of yourself and know you will never get it back. To look at the sunset every day across the water and feel farther away than ever before. To know that in an instant you lost everything—more than even your bending; you have lost your family, your _life_.

_Yes, they have taken away your ability to bend, but they can't take away your courage and it is your courage they should truly fear!_

We had courage in the beginning, we had hope, but it was all for naught when we were overpowered and lost the battle anyway, lost more than we ever thought we could lose. Now they would laugh at our courage, laugh knowing that they are the ones who have taken it, they are the ones who hold it in their hands.

There is nothing left but to try and survive. We do what we can; we carry on day after day, just _surviving_. It's not out of hope, it's not a life.

But it's all we have left to hold on to anymore.


	56. Winter Solstice

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Winter Solstice (056/100)  
**Word count: **182 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: implied images (reading between the lines)**  
****Notes**: Cause Iroh fics are hard to resist. :3

* * *

**Winter Solstice**

_I'm chasing the Avatar. My father will understand why I'm returning home._

Oh Zuko, how I wish that were true, if only for your sake. How much I wish that you were really chasing a dream—not being the star of some wild goose chase all the way around the world. How much I wish that your father actually cared more about you; that your past was not what it was. _That things had not turned out the way they did_.

Part of it is my fault, of course. I never should have let you go into that meeting. I should have known what was going to happen there. I should have known what was going to happen at Ba Sing Se all those years ago, and not done what I did_. I should have known better_.

People call me wise and call me the great Dragon of the West, looking up to me in reverence. They see this great man, this powerful man, this figure with so much power and strength and _wisdom_.

If only they knew the truth.


	57. The Waterbending Scroll

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Waterbending Scroll (057/100)  
**Word count: **284 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: **SPOILERS for _The Western Air Temple_!  
Notes**: This is another of my drabbles that uses (and has its basis) in the episode it's named after; but isn't _set_ in this episode. This drabble instead is set **during/post**-WAT. :3 (Oh, Katara.)

* * *

**The Waterbending Scroll**

_I'll save you from the pirates_. These are words of my nightmares, words that have been in my head ever since that day oh so many months ago. It doesn't help that every time I see my mother's necklace_, I see his face_. The hauntingly dark eyes, the mouth permanently set in that cruel scowl. The blatant red scar across his eye, the scar of a terrible past I can see hidden just behind his eyes.

And we keep meeting, he always with those words that trap me, those bits and pieces of a story that creep into my mind and refuse to let me forget them.

_I've changed_. He says it _again_, as if I'll believe him again. As if I'll trust him again. As if I'll think of him as anything more than what he is—a liar and a cold-hearted bastard who cares about no one but himself and his precious _honor_. Oh, he tells us all about how he's different now—how he knows what having honor is and how he's finally realized his destiny is to teach Aang firebending and how he wants to join the group _and blah blah blah_.

He's got a new haircut, maybe, and some different clothes, and he's not with his uncle anymore (which makes me only suspect something is up even more so) nor with his psychopath of a sister. And he's changed his way of thinking, trying to make us believe he's on the _good_ side now, that he's on _our_ side. (He thinks it'll work, he thinks we'll _believe_ him.)

He's _changed_, alright.


	58. Jet

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Jet (058/100) **Rating**: PG (just implications)  
**Word count: **410 (I got really carried away XD) **Warnings**:_ totally minor spoilers that cause you to have to stand on your head and squint to see them_ (meaning you could have not seen any of the recent episodes and totally **not **be spoiled at all)**  
****Notes**: This COMPLETELY did not come out the same way I started it. XP One character transformed into another, and by the time I was done I realized I was suddenly writing something set in season 3. XD

The main character (the main perspective) is Sokka, btw. ;3 (The character at the end can be one of two characters—the one at the beginning of the drabble or a different one that fits the description (written at the end of the drabble) during the middle of season :3)

* * *

**Jet**

_Who would be free__—everyone would be dead.__  
_

We were always taught that the war was two sides—the Fire Nation versus everybody else. (This only included the Earth Kingdom and the barely surviving Water Tribes after the initial strike of the Fire Nation, after the annihilation of the Air Nomads.) Our parents and the other adults of our tribe always told how the Fire Nation people were the evil ones, how they were the ones using dirty tricks and horrible crimes to win. We were the good side—we fought fair and we were bringing peace to the world; we were trying to stop the Fire Nation from destroying what was left of the world we lived in.

But now, it's become a game of revenge. _The fire nation killed my parents—they deserve to be punished, to be exterminated so this will never happen again._ He was only one person and he didn't say it exactly that way—but it means the same thing. Even more, there are a whole other lot of people that feel the same way. People don't have to say what has become their actions, what has become their thoughts and their words; their _destiny._ It has conformed them, changed them to the point of being unrecognizable. Look at our little group and see how it has changed each one of us, how we've hardened to the point of breaking, the one destiny of bringing down the fire nation (_of revenge_) upon us.

It all comes down to the realization that there's no longer black and white in the world, that there hasn't been for a long time.

For there's that awful gray area, the point when black and white _blur_. The point when good and bad blend and you can no longer tell which one you're seeing, which one the person beside you is acting upon. The point when you yourself do not know what you're doing anymore, what side you're even on. _It's the point when friends become enemies, and when enemies become friends_. It's something that I've just begun to understand, something that even now swirls around in my mind when I look at _him _beside me and wonder what has happened.

And he smiles and I realize that I've just been too blind to see it. We all have.

_But maybe it'll be what saves us._


	59. The Great Divide

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Great Divide (059/100)  
**Word count:** 202 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: abstractness at first, sorry**  
****Notes**: Gah, this is about THE hardest episode to write a drabble for; there's nearly nothing to use. XP But I did anyway…for the sake of this whole challenge and everything. XD

* * *

**The Great Divide**

_I suppose it's time we forget the past…and look to the future._

It all seems so simple; forgiving and forgetting, moving on with our lives. Taking into account change and changing ourselves, believing in things we never would have considered before, people we never thought to change. So incredibly simple…but so frustratingly _difficult_ in reality.

For words are not easily forgotten and neither are harsh actions, memories that stick in our minds and flash in front of our eyes every time we see the offender, whether it be a person or otherwise. We hold grudges, forming invisible canyons and boundaries between each other constantly. _We don't forget_…period. We say we forgive…but are lying.

It's what makes us hesitate to change, to see and believe in change, _to trust it_. It's what makes us all hesitate right now—with change right in front us, a _person _transformed right before our eyes.

But someone has to take the first step. To bridge those lost connections, forget those terrible grudges.

All it takes is one person…and that person is me.

_You see that? Settling feuds and making peace. All in a days work for the Avatar._


	60. The Storm

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Storm (060/100)  
**Word count: **228 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: Whereas the last episode was so hard because there was few things I could use for it; this episode was even harder because there was too _many_. XD Seriously, I started off with 10+ possible quotes to use, ideas to derive the drabble from…I could probably do quite a few drabbles with this episode; there's just so many perspectives in it, so many thoughts, so many words!

And 40 more (days/drabbles). XP

* * *

**The Storm**

_Things will never return to normal._

Everything changes in a heartbeat, and normal is no longer same. _In a second, everything is different_. We'll never be able to go back to what happened before…we'll never be able to see what would have happened if things had gone differently. We wish so fervently to change time—to go back to the past—and cry in rage when unable to_. Time stops for no one_.

But we keep wishing anyway.

_I looked away._

The fire crackles in front of me as I stare far beyond its depths, wishing so many impossible things. Blood trickles down my cheek as I bite down on my lip and wish for anything (_anything at all_) to distract me from the pain inside. _I just can't believe that things wouldn't have been different…_if I said something different…if I had done something different.

The flames flash and I'm gone.

_We need you, Aang. We need you._

I need you too I need you to help me, support me. I need you to show me the way out of this tunnel I'm trapped in, this ever-black cavern of darkness and despair._ I need you more than you'll ever know._

I just don't know what to do.

_But I'm sorry, I'm so sorry… for everything._


	61. The Blue Spirit

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Blue Spirit (061/100)  
**Word count:** 240 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: Gah, I need more sleep. Sorry if these drabbles are turning into ramblings of my weary mind. D: (And this isn't meant to be shippy; sorry if it sounds that way. DX)

* * *

**The Blue Spirit**

_If we knew each other back then;_

If. If we had known each other. If we had known each other _back then_; back before the war started, back when all four nations were at peace. If things were different. _If_.

_Do you think we could have been friends too?_

Friends. Allies. Something that I once thought was possible, offered it, believed it possible. Believed that there was something more to you than what you appeared. You saved me when no one else could, even though you could've left me for the dead. Maybe you wanted to do it so you could capture the Avatar yourself…but maybe it's something else. Maybe it's fate.

Somehow I just keep coming back to the fact that our destinies always seem to be intertwined, traveling in and out of each other until I don't know where one stops and the other begins. We are two very different people…but somehow, there's a connection. There's just something that we're not seeing. Something that's the answer to everything, the reason _why_. Why we keep meeting. Why I feel so terrible after saying the words that I can't but help saying after all that has happened._ Why the roles have reversed, and you are me and I you. _

Then I look at your face, and somehow I know (_I can see_)…we aren't so different after all.


	62. The Fortuneteller

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Fortuneteller (062/100)  
**Word count:** 160 **Rating**: T -just implications, this can be rated higher or lower depending on how deeply you interpret the words…**  
****Notes**: So ironic that I'm writing about this episode when we were _just_ discussing this episode in light of the war between Kataang and Zutara at Distant Horizons. XD

* * *

**The Fortuneteller**

_I feel great romance for you._

It's what I've always wanted, what every girl my age wants. It's something we dream about, a fairytale that we are so certain will come true; a vision of a perfect life. Life twists and there's that one constant, that one hope that somehow everything will turn out alright even when perfect is no longer possible. We just keep hoping, just keep dreaming…

_The man you're going to marry__…__I can see that he is a very powerful bender._

And he will understand me. He will love and cherish me, and he will _understand_. He won't let me be anything less than who I am, the strong and passionate waterbender of the Southern Water Tribe. The stubborn girl who never gives up. The healer of injuries, of hearts.

He'll understand me; he'll _know_ me. This is the man I will marry.

_He's out there, waiting…_


	63. Bato of the Water Tribe

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Bato of the Water Tribe (063/100)  
**Word count:** _100! _**Rating**: PG **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: Another perspective I've never tried before…

* * *

**Bato of the Water Tribe**

_Being a man is knowing where you're needed the most, and for you right now that's here protecting your sister._

It means sacrificing your own wants for the needs of others. It means giving up nearly everything you've ever called your own; giving up any semblance of familiarity for the unknown, courageously leading others out of the darkness. _A man fights for his people, his family, himself_. He is strong and brave, yes, but he also knows reality and knows his own weaknesses.

_I don't understand._

Most of all, it means _knowing when to let go._


	64. The Deserter

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Deserter (064/100)  
**Word count:** 327 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: I love this episode for its awesome quotes and Jeong Jeong's _amazing_ wisdom. ;DDD

* * *

**The Deserter**

_I've always wished I were blessed like you—free from this burning curse._

Even now I can remember my childhood in the Fire Nation, can remember how we were always told fire was the best element, _the greatest element of all._

What a lie that was.

It is something that will follow me to my grave, something that I cannot part with even when I try. It is implanted in my body, something that forces its way out and soon enough falls out my control, destroying everything in its path.

_Water brings healing and life. But fire brings only destruction and pain. It forces those of us burdened with its care to walk a razor's edge between humanity and savagery. Eventually, we are torn apart._

You just have to look at how many lives have been destroyed by this war to see the terror of an element that is_ fire_. Look even at the Fire Lord's own _son_—the boy's life was destroyed in an instant with that one burst of fire that hit too close to home. Look at this girl, her hands burned in one moment of carelessness, the accident caused by someone who cared so much for her.

_Learn restraint, or risk destroying yourself and everything you love._

And then look at the Avatar, the one who will have to master this destructive element once again to save the world. To save us all, he will have to counter fire with fire. One slip up and it will be the end—_for him, for everyone_.

He has raw power, yes. But that will not be enough. I taught him all I knew…but he needs now a master who knows more the danger of fire than even I, a person who has very literally felt the pain of fire.

And in an instant I know the person the Avatar needs.

_If only things were different…if only they could meet…_


	65. The Northern Air Temple

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Northern Air Temple (065/100)  
**Word count:** 130 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: abstractness**  
****Notes**: Blah, not what I wanted it to be in the beginning…but it's getting late, so I'm going to bed and leaving this as it is. XP

* * *

**The Northern Air Temple**

_Nature knows where to stop._

Nature would have never gone this far, would have never destroyed so many precious things in the process. It fulfills death with new life, it balances what it has destroyed with what it has created. It lives all around us, is a part of every living thing and makes this world what it is. It is the creator, and we are the creation.

Yet Nature itself will be destroyed in the process of what the Fire Nation is trying to do, what the other nations are only helping to carry out as long as this war progresses.

This world we live in is being destroyed day by day, minute by minute, _second by second._

And in the end, all that will be left is ash.


	66. The Waterbending Master

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Waterbending Master (066/100)  
**Word count:** 316 **Rating**: T **Warnings**: implications **  
****Notes**: This drabble has just inspired me to write another fic once my Sokkla one is finished; a fic on the relationship between Pakku and Kana. ;3 (Oh and this drabble _isn't told chronologically_, just to let you know '')

_EDITEDIT: And LOL, I just somehow (unintentionally) made this fic very much representative of the spirit of Christmas, perfect for today/tonight/tomorrow. (Well, kind of---you'll see XD) __**Merry Christmas, everyone.**_

* * *

**The Waterbending Master**

_But she didn't love you, did she? It was an arranged marriage._

Kana wanted the most what she didn't have in the Northern Tribe—her freedom. She wanted the freedom to do whatever the heck she wanted, to practice what she wanted, to marry who she wanted. _She wanted to be able to_ _want_ _things without being refused_,_ without having to follow all of the countless traditions of the tribe_. She wanted all that she didn't have _so bad_ that she clung to one of her only freedoms left.

Her freedom to leave. _**And never come back.**_

_Gran-Gran wouldn't let your tribe's stupid customs run her life. That's why she left. It must have taken a lot of courage._

Kana wondered—no, she _knew _that Katara would meet him. She knew it was destiny that her granddaughter was going to where it all started, the place where she herself had fled from decades ago. _She would meet him_.

And Katara had the necklace.

_I don't know. That's always been a mystery to me. She left without saying goodbye._

She resisted the urge to slam the door shut, instead closing it softly enough that her sleeping parents would not awake. She tip-toed down the hall and out the door until she was running, running until her lungs burst. Running until she was far away from the place that was no longer her home.

It was only later when she was on a merchant ship halfway to the Earth Kingdom that she let the tears fall, the tiny droplets falling on the necklace of a relationship that would never be.

And she looked out at the open ocean, seeing a place far away where she could have a new beginning.

_Where we both can have a new beginning_, she thought, a hand sliding down onto her hidden belly.


	67. The Siege of the North

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Siege of the North (067/100)  
**Word count:** 250 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: no, it's_ not_ a Zuko fic, sorry**  
****Notes**: Again, if you'll remember my notes from drabble #51; chapters that are two parts (two episodes) will be combined to one drabble. Also, I have to say that this was another hard drabble to write, if for the fact that there were so many good quotes to use, so many angles to take. ;3 Season finales always have a lot of transformations in them, a lot of plot twists…and that made this drabble so hard to write. XD _And season 2 after this drabble, woot!_

* * *

**The Siege of the North**

_Our healers did everything they could. They told my mother and father I was going to die._

Imagine dying before even living, the end of a new life before it had even started. Imagine two parents, desperately clinging to a daughter they would never have, a child that would not outlive her parents.

Imagine that…as the beginning of my life.

_You have been touched by the Moon Spirit. Some of its life is in you._

The Moon Spirit gave me life, it let me hold onto my body for sixteen years. Sixteen long years—that isn't much of a life, but it was mine, and it was much longer than I had ever been expected to live at the beginning. The Spirit gave me one of the most precious things we have in this world—_time_.

And in the end, it wasn't enough. After all the time I had, I didn't find what I was looking for until the very end.

Until I had no time left.

_I won't let you! Your father told me to protect you!_

I found love in the very last weeks of my life—I found it, when I was engaged to another guy, no less. Love came to me and gave me strength, gave me the power to do possibly the hardest thing ever.

To finally let go, when all my life I had been fighting to hold on.

_Goodbye, Sokka. I will always be with you._


	68. The Avatar State

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Avatar State (068/100)  
**Word count:** 285 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: implications **  
****Notes**: The first episode of seasons _also_ bring plenty of quotes to use with all of the new perspectives and new things to think about. ;3 So this was another hard drabble to write, though intriguing enough once I got started on [the one quote I was using.

This is a very debatable topic; usually between the two main sets of shippers. XP I hope I stayed as neutral as I could in this…

* * *

**The Avatar State**

_In the avatar state you are at your most powerful, but you are also at your most vulnerable._

A double-edged sword. Something that has the power to be my worst downfall or my greatest triumph. Something with enough power to wipe out thousands of soldiers on the outside…or kill the person on the inside.

_If you are killed in the Avatar state, the reincarnation cycle will be broken and the Avatar will cease to exist._

It was a warning. A warning I should have heeded, one I should have listened to more closely and taken with more caution. I should have learned from the mistakes of my past lives; should have remembered the story with Koh, the story with Sozin. A mistake is just a mistake—but not when the Avatar makes it. When the Avatar slips, it is catastrophic. (_We are only human…but at the same time, we are not human at all.)_

I was ready…I was ready to master the Avatar State. I was ready to be able to command more and greater power than any other being in the world.

But in the end, I did not choose power. After all the Guru had told me, I did not choose what was expected of me, what was needed of me. I chose what _I _wanted, what _I _needed more than anything in the world. I didn't think about what consequences would come if I chose the one over the other, what it would mean to me, to _everyone_, if I chose love instead of power.

But I have learned. I know now what the other Avatars did not.

_And I know you cannot ever have them both._


	69. The Cave of Two Lovers

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **The Cave of Two Lovers (069/100)  
**Word count:** _100! _**Rating**: G **Warnings**: abstract writing XP**  
****Notes**: Drat. The episode of ship wars and crazy FANDOM WANK. So I, usually trying to stay as neutral as possible, decided it was better to take a _different_ perspective on the episode for this drabble…

* * *

**The Cave of Two Lovers**

_That's how the two lovers found each other. They just put out their lights and followed the crystals._

For to have light, there must also be darkness. For good there must be evil. For right there must be wrong. To go forward we must go back. And in our deepest fall we find our greatest triumph. _A world of opposites depending on the balance between the two extremes_.

But it is only a thin line that separates the two—and sooner or later, the line becomes blurred.

And the question that once was _what side_ becomes _which is which?_


	70. Return to Omashu

**Title:** 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title: **Return To Omashu (070/100)  
**Word count: **173 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: sadness D:**  
****Notes**: I like using the phrase "but it's not enough" a lot, you'll notice. XD It just fits so well with the characters, though…there's just some things they'll never have, but they want so desperately anyway…_(And whoops, the character I used for this drabble isn't even __**in**__ the episode—though they are __**mentioned**__; are __**implied**__ in the episode…)_

* * *

**Return To Omashu**

_Your teacher will be someone who has mastered neutral jin. You need to find someone who waits and listens before striking._

I listen to the earth before striking; I listen to the rhythms of people's heartbeats and their breathing to see if they're lying. I listen and feel for emotions; I listen for the words and actions I cannot see. I listen, listen, _listen_.

But it's not enough.

I can listen to the vibrations of the earth all I want…but I'll never be able to picture his face. I can listen to his laugh, his voice, his _sarcasm_…but I'll never be able to see his mouth, never be able to see his bright eyes or casual smile. _His expression of easy joy, the way laughter lights up his face._

And yet, I don't need to see at all to feel the teardrop rolling down his eye at the idea of _her _being a prisoner or possibly dead.

I turn away.

_It doesn't matter anyway._


	71. The Swamp

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Swamp (071/100)  
**Word count**: 129 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: _**WAT spoilers!**_**  
****Notes**: Bugger, I used almost _all _of the content in this episode for other drabbles. XD (#31, #45, and #47) But I did happen to find one last thing that I haven't used yet…

* * *

**The Swamp**

_Everything is connected._

In his mind's eye he can see the accident, an almost exact replica of what happened many months ago, a scene that reflects before his eyes every time he looks into herdark blue eyes. _The scars of the past have disappeared, but the memories remain. _

It is history repeated_—_though he hadn't seen it until now.

He glances over to the earthbender, her blemished feet so similar to the look the hands that had healed her had so many months ago, the hands that had been burned in an accident just like this one.

And he understands._ He's the one._

His gaze turns back toward the scarred boy in front of him.

_He's the one destined to be my firebending teacher._


	72. Avatar Day

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Avatar Day (072/100)  
**Word count**: 136 **Rating**: T **Warnings**: intense images**  
****Notes**: As funny as some of Sokka's lines were…they're no use for a drabble such as this. XP This has got to be possibly _the_ worst episode to use for a drabble (other than "The Great Divide XP) other than the fact that Iroh _does _have some amazingly wise lines in it. (That and the line I used for this drabble…)

* * *

**Avatar Day**

_Actually, she and the other warriors left to fight in the war. You kids had a big impact on Suki. She said you inspired her and she wanted to help change the world._

The sound of stagnant water dripping loudly down from the musty ceiling resonated in the tiny cell, the sharp wind howling outside the bars upon the tiny window. And the window was not much of a window at all; the bars covering an opening in the wall that let all the freezing wind come inside and swirl around flaky skin and brittle bones, the empty remnants of what was once a great warrior.

The eye sockets shifted, frozen on the scene outside the window, the wind a prelude to the powerful storm that would sure to follow.

_It would not be long now…_


	73. The Blind Bandit

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Blind Bandit (073/100)  
**Word count**: 189 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: HAPPY NEW YEAR! Let us ring in 2008 with TOPH!

* * *

**The Blind Bandit**

_Yeah. You guys get to go wherever you want. No one telling you what to do, that's the life. It's just not my life._

My life was set in stone from the day I was born, the day I was born blind. I was born without the sight of the world—and it shortsighted everyone else's opinion of me. They see me and think of a weak, helpless little girl. They don't see the powerful earthbender—they don't even _acknowledge_ it. It's just another reason for me to be locked up forever. Not so I don't have a chance to hurt anyone else—but so I can't hurt myself.

But they're all wrong.

_My dad changed his mind. He said I was free to travel the world._

This is my chance to prove that I'm more than everyone sees. My chance to do something different, to get the heck out of the life everyone expects me to lead. It's my chance to do the impossible and finally see the world.

_This is my chance to finally be me._


	74. Zuko Alone

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Zuko Alone (074/100)  
**Word count**: _100!_ **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: Happy 2008, everyone. :)

* * *

**Zuko Alone**

_Everything I've done, I've done to protect you. Remember this, Zuko. No matter how things may seem to change, never forget who you are._

She gave away her life so I could have mine. She accepted her banishment so that I wouldn't have to go through much worse. She did it all—and she did it for me. For the son that her husband always thought weak and worthless. _For me_.

She's alive and out there somewhere…waiting.

_I'll find you, Mom…but first I'm going to make you proud and fulfill my destiny._


	75. The Chase

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Chase (075/100)  
**Word count**: 155 **Rating**: T+ **Warnings**: brief gore**  
****Notes**: I am now **3/4** of the way done with this challenge, and I have to say thanks to all of you amazing reviewers and just plain viewers. **240** reviews and **15,000+ **hits **here alone**. Thank you also to **jillrg** for giving me my 100th review, and **speak546** for giving me my 200th review. (And if you're wondering, this drabble comes because of _Sweeney Todd_, which I just saw a day ago. XP)

* * *

**The Chase**

_Well, look at this. Enemies and traitors all working together. I'm done. I know when I'm beaten. You got me. A princess surrenders with honor._

I knew the day would come; I knew from the moment all those months ago when they first fought together. It was only inevitable that they joined up, knowing they were all running from a common enemy. It only took longer because of my brother's ridiculous pride and his lost honor, along with the fact that he had been hunting the Avatar for so long. But it would happen, however long it would take. _I knew it._

I just never knew the next time we met again, it would be like this.

_You never were much of a princess, Azula_. Shock comes for only a second when blood paints the ground dark red in front of me before blackness colors the sky and there is nothing anymore.


	76. Bitter Work

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Bitter Work (076/100)  
**Word count**: 193 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: Hey guys, you probably heard this from me before sometime in the past month or so, but yeah, _**I'm getting all of my wisdom teeth taken out tomorrow, so I don't know when I'll be back with these drabbles.**_ Hopefully I'll be feeling better in a few days and will be able to do drabble #77 on Saturday or Sunday, but you never know. Just letting you know. :)

* * *

**Bitter Work**

_If you are lucky, you will never have to use this technique at all._

If I was lucky I wouldn't _be_ in this situation in the first place.

I wouldn't have a permanent scar on my face. I wouldn't be banished. I wouldn't be running from my sister on the grounds of pains worse than death for months. And I certainly would not be living a lie, waiting for the moment my father found out about the not-so-dead Avatar. But here I am anyway, _lucky to be born._

And it just so happens that I have worst luck of all.

_Now I realize that banishment is far too merciful a penalty for treason. Your penalty will be __far__ steeper._

But for once, my luck has paid off. In the most crucial of moments, somehow I found strength. To stand up to my father, to stand up and reject everything I've ever known and wanted when it was right at my fingertips.

_And this is how I know I'll have strength enough when the time comes to help the Avatar defeat him once and for all._


	77. The Library and the Desert

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Library and the Desert (077/100)  
**Word count**: _100!_ **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: A different angle to this drabble than most would take…**Also thank you all so much for your concern**; I'm finally feeling much better from my surgery and am back on my feet, both at school and writing these drabbles. The surgery went well, and I'm very glad that it's over with so I can back to my life. :)

* * *

**The Library and the Desert**

_I have a natural curiosity._

And sometimes, hallucinations are better than reality. When everything goes crazy, sometimes all you want to do is to take a step back from the world. When reality gets overbearing, most people fall apart at the seams. It's what you _do_ with what you have that means the most. And for me, hallucinating is my way of dealing with what's happening to us right now. Some would call it foolishness, others call it naivety; but whatever you call it, it's one thing that _I_ need more than anything right now.

_An escape._


	78. Secret of the Fire Nation

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Secret of the Fire Nation (078/100)  
**Word count**: 167 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: I've done a few similar pieces; this takes a slightly different angle on things…(And this totally has nothing to do with the actual _secret_ of the Fire Nation XD)

* * *

**Secret of the Fire Nation**

_I'm doing fine. Would everybody stop worrying about me!_

Everyone worries about me like I'm a little kid. For Spirits sake, I'm a hundred and twelve years old. So I was in an iceberg for a hundred of those years and have only actually seen the world for twelve of them. In those twelve years, I've seen more than a grown man has in his whole life. I've had to deal with so much, take on so much responsibility. I've had to make so many decisions, work out so many problems.

I've done so much—and yet everybody thinks it to be nothing! They still treat me as if I'm someone that needs constant care, constant attention—a little kid who needs to be babied all the time. I know they care about me, but I can take care of myself.

I just wish for once, people would actually _see_ me.

And now I understand Toph more than ever.


	79. City of Walls and Secrets

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: City of Walls and Secrets (079/100)  
**Word count**: 211 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: An interesting perspective I have not tried before. (I also tried to incorporate more detail and higher writing skills into this drabble—subtle hints and some abstract ideas that come in well written novels)

* * *

**City of Walls and Secrets**

_I thought we were starting over here, changing our ways._

One glance in his eyes and she can tell it isn't going to happen anytime soon. He is beyond stubborn, clinging so hard to revenge and terrible memories from the past that he cannot see a new beginning, a blank future. Here is a chance to wipe the slate clean and start over for once, forgetting the past they are not quite proud of anymore. But he is resilient to her pleas, the one bud of suspicion bringing him right back to where he started.

Putting her hand on his shoulder, she tries to soothe him, break him out of the vicious cycle he has succumbed to—even as she finds it to be pointless. But she cannot but help clutch the tiny bit of hope he will break out of his reverie and see that he is repeating history once more.

_You don't understand! They're Fire Nation! You have to believe me!_

She gazes at him sadly before turning away. Finding strength in tragedy, she does what he cannot do. And it does not take a glance for the boy beside her to understand her decision.

They walk away.

…_but maybe it is time to let go._


	80. Tales of Ba Sing Se

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Tales of Ba Sing Se (080/100)  
**Word count**: 400 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: sadness :(**  
****Notes**: This is something I hesitatingly started—and then it just kept going and going and _going_. I will tell you straight up that it is extremely sad—but you will find it emotionally satisfying, the power in the words overcoming the tearful theme of the piece.

* * *

**Tales of Ba Sing Se**

_A flash and images crowd the space, each vying for placement. The most vivid memory of all grabs at the edges, finally shoving itself into the center. _

_The battlefield strewn with corpses, bloody outfits and men that belong to neither side anymore. A grasp at his boot and he turns, ready to shake off a person that is not the one he is looking for. The man clings to his boot, gasping in pain at a chest wound. The soldier's outfit is half-ripped off and torn in places, bloody in others, and he is about to move on when the man speaks._

_Please, and his voice cracks, end my pain. The once bright gold eyes are dim amber now, delirious from the screaming pain, and they do not hold any recognition in them. Please, the soldier begs again, let it be over now._

_He is crying now, kneeling down beside the soldier and grasping his palm, as if he is the one fighting for his life. The soldier screams and his breathing coming out in pants muffles his words, each syllable coming out choked. Please…end…it…all… And he cannot do anything but watch as the man convulses again, the pain beyond the point of words. He is frozen in his spot, not able to save the man but not willing to end his life either. _

_The man is ghastly white now, the blood loss causing the rest of his body to shut down. And it takes only a moment before the body goes limp, the hand falling weakly out of his own. _

_It is over._

_And he has done nothing._

The water falls down his cheeks, each tear a regret. He has wished for so many things over the years, but he wishes more than anything to go back to that day. He would move mountains to change history, to change time and space and words. His whole life has been about power, but it was when he was at its peak that he found himself at the very bottom, more powerless than he could have imagined.

Later he will tell the Avatar power is overrated, saying that it is better to choose love instead. He learned the hard way, the most painful way of all. He cannot let anybody else make the same mistake.

_Happy Birthday, my son. If only I could have helped you._


	81. Appa's Lost Days

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Appa's Lost Days (081/100)  
**Word count**: 258 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: I wrote a similar piece to this, but much, _much_ darker. (The one with the cell and the…err—_body_…remember? #72: Avatar Day) Yet this drabble isn't completely light, either…

* * *

**Appa's Lost Days**

_Well that's ok, any friend of the Avatar, is an enemy of mine. _

_You're __not__ prettier than we are!_

_You're so colorful, it's making me nauseous._

The insults are only used as distractions. They care not what we think, only what we feel. They use words to make us feel rage and make a mistake, one that can only be deadly in this situation. They want us to fail, to trip, to lose _They care only about winning_. But we are different. We have heart, passion, love. Our mission is to protect those who cannot protect themselves, to save this big beast from torture worse than death at the hands of their leader.

Shecounts it as a mistake when I put my life in danger by saving the sky bison's. Those mere seconds cost me, moments in time she does not wait to act upon. _You have lost this battle, she sneers._

But she knows nothing.

The prison cell is a small price to pay for what we have done. And when the Avatar and his friends win the war, it will not even matter. This imprisonment is nothing, it is not a life sentence. I will be saved. _We all will._

I stare defiantly back at her, knowing that her torture can never touch my spirit. Death or freedom will embrace me before I submit to her will. My body will ache in pains beyond comprehension, but my heart is free, my soul intact.

_Her judgment day has yet to come._


	82. Lake Laogai

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Lake Laogai (082/100)  
**Word count**: 246 **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: _miniscule WAT spoilers that you'd have to stand on your head and squint to see_**  
****Notes**: I know some of you wanted me to do another drabble about Smellerbee…but this drabble just kind of came out instead. I'm sorry. (and this drabble has the tiniest of WAT spoilers…**but only if you've seen the episode will you even realize that [the spoilers are in there**. XP)

* * *

**Lake Laogai**

_Katara! I've changed! I don't want to fight you! I'm here to help._

I have lost count of the number of people that have told me these exact words or ones to the same extent. They tell me words that constantly ring in my head, syllables of broken promises and lost second chances that threaten to confine me within their walls. Their faces are formed in sadness, their expression one they think I cannot refuse. _They think I'll believe them. Again._

I held their word the first time, in the first place. I listened to them so easily when I was a naïve little girl who couldn't possibly imagine that people so like herself were not who she thought they were. This girl couldn't imagine the lies that twisted the world, couldn't see beyond the innocent faces and words like safety nets. These people expect this girl again, expect her to take pity on them and forgive them and comfort their poor, tormented souls.

_Tell it to some other girl, Jet!_

They are in for a rude awakening, because I am not that girl and I will never be her again. I will look at them coldly and not be merciful. I will not hesitate to let them know where I stand on their _transformation_ and I will certainly not treat them as if nothing has happened.

I will never forgive, and I certainly won't ever _forget._


	83. The Earth King

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Earth King (083/100)  
**Word count**: 269 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: I love writing new & different perspectives; it helps my writing improve by allowing me to think as different characters…and it makes these drabbles more interesting to read, I hope. :3

* * *

**The Earth King**_  
_

_Well, sir, there is a war going on right now. For the past 100 years, in fact. The Dai Li's kept it secret from you. It's a conspiracy to control the city, and to control you. Long Feng didn't want us to tell you, so he stole our Sky Bison to blackmail us. And blackmail is the least of his crimes, he brain washed our friend!  
_

The boy's eyes are sincere, his tone pleading and his stance humble. One would think I am a fool not to believe him—but it is that or believe the fact that my most trusted advisor has been lying to me all along. This group has put me in an unthinkable situation, one I have not had to deal with—_ever_. And that thought alone triggers a red flag in my mind, another question for a day that has been nothing but. I am King—but what monarch's reign has ever been completely peaceful, without even one tiny problem to solve?

I glance between the two again, my eyes seeking out which is trying to make me the fool.

_I have to trust my advisor._

Where has the Avatar been all this time? He certainly has not been in the city, has not been seen across the world for so long. My advisor has been the one with me this entire time, helping me lead this great city, this great nation. But that makes me draw pause again, the memories welling up like a clogged drain pulled free.

_Who has been truly leading this nation, he or I?_


	84. The Crossroads of Destiny

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Crossroads of Destiny (084/100)  
**Word count**: 215 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: Again, you have absolutely NO IDEA how hard the season finale drabbles are to write. There's just so many quotes, so many different plots, characters, motives, ect…you could do_ dozens _of drabbles off the finales……but I just chose one idea, and I hope you like the drabble that resulted. :)

* * *

**The Crossroads of Destiny**

_No. I'm tired of running. It's time I faced Azula!_

All this time, I've been running to and from so many things. _Azula. My father. The Avatar._ Sometimes I don't know which I'm running from anymore, and which I'm running towards. But I know it's time I stopped running. I'm so tired of it; I'm just so tired of not going anywhere in my life. _And I've finally realized that my life isn't going to change—unless I change it._

It's time I finally stood my ground and faced my problems head on; it's time I faced up to the things I've been running from all along.

_You are free to choose._

She says it like I have a choice, when in reality it is something we both know I do not have. _Just like everything else in life_. Uncle even knows this, though he desperately wants to believe otherwise, is trying to convince me otherwise. But I know there is no choice in this matter—there hasn't been for a long time. _Her face flashes before my mind, the tears dripping down it ones I know will scar me forever._

And even as she leaves, we both know my decision.


	85. The Awakening

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Awakening (085/100)  
**Word count**: 138 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: Season 3 now, woot! I'm catching up to the episodes so fast, I have no idea what I'm going to do once I get to an episode that hasn't aired yet…(Also, much love for Roku, even though he did make quite a big mistake or two. ;;)

* * *

**The Awakening**

_If anyone is to blame for the state of the world, it is me. I should've seen this war coming, and prevented it._

I knew it was coming—I just didn't want to see it. Because then I'd have to _acknowledge_ the fact that it was there, acknowledge the fact that we no longer were the same people we were so long ago. If I ignored it, I wouldn't have to deny anything, _wouldn't have to constantly feel badgered by fears of something that would destroy the whole balance of the world._

I wouldn't have to deny the fact that my _best_ friend in the whole world, was possibly going against all rules of nature. Of peace. Of the Avatar himself.

Against _me._

_Spirits, how did we ever get to this point?_


	86. The Headband

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Headband (086/100)  
**Word count**: _100! _**Rating**: G **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: This is an…interesting idea I had. ;3

* * *

**The Headband**

_Oh, Mai...Ty Lee needs your help untangling her braid. _

He'll take it as an insult that I'm succumbing to Azula's demands…but she's his_ sister_. And no matter how much they mock each other and fight, they're siblings, _royal _siblings. I'm a noble, and Azula's one of my best friends—but neither means anything when it comes to the Princess. _When it comes to royalty, everyone must bow down._

We pass glances and she smirks (_a thousand meanings in one_), reminding both of us who is truly the one with power here.


	87. The Painted Lady

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Painted Lady (087/100)  
**Word count**: 181 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: why did you have to betray me so with your LACK of a transcript for this episode? D: I had to go to _wikiquot_e, and could only find ONE good quote to use! DX It's better than nothing, I guess, and the quote itself was a pretty powerful one, though a bit redundant..._(The drabble makes it different, though :3)_

_

* * *

_**The Painted Lady**

_No! I will __never__ turn my back on people who need me!_

Because when I needed it most of all, there was no one there for me. My brother will argue and say that _he _was there, our _grandmother _was there—but he was barely older than I, and Gran Gran practically needed protecting herself. There just was no one there to watch me, support me when I fell and pull me back up again.

I had to do it all myself—I had to be strong enough to get through it all.

But mostly, I think (_and it is a secret that I will never tell_) it was because of _her_. The one who I failed to help, the one whose death I will regret until my dying day. Sometimes I think that my determination to develop my bending came from that fact that I wasn't strong enough to save her. And ever since I have tried to heal every possible person I can, vowing to make up for the one life that mattered the most.

_Forgive me, Mom._


	88. Sokka's Master

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Sokka's Master (088/100)  
**Word count**: 146 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: I know how much you were looking forward to this drabble, lj user: **plushulala** . I hope I didn't fail miserably…:X (also, this drabble reminds me greatly of _Hercules_. If you've re-watched the movie lately, you'll understand…and yet I haven't even seen the movie in awhile…guess I have a good memory. XD)

* * *

**Sokka's Master**

_You told me you didn't know if you were worthy, but I believe that you are more worthy than any man I have ever trained.  
_

They boast about their accomplishments, thinking I'll be impressed. Casual smiles and prideful stances come immediately, boys and men alike hinting oh so subtly how much I'll gain by taking them on, smirking to their friends about how they've _got it in the bag_. They have heard I am the best, and they are rooted in the belief that they _deserve _the best. They, after all, are skillful, confident, strong and willing.

_But they are not worthy._

They do not understand that those skills do not define a warrior, cannot possibly see past the history driven image of a man with a sword. It is not courage or skill that defines a warrior.

_It is his heart._


	89. The Beach

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Beach (089/100)  
**Word count**: _100! _**Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: Oh man, I practically used this episode up for all of my other drabbles. XP (#4, #6, #26, #29, #37, #39, #41) I'll see what I can do with what's left………And yet somehow I just randomly started writing with one of the quotes leftover and somehow managed to write something. XD

* * *

**The Beach**

_Yes, I know, and I love it! But for once, I just wanted to see how people would treat us if they didn't know who we were._

Maybe I don't want to be _me_ for once. Maybe I want to see what it's like to be like everybody else, to be a normal person without any of the joys or burdens of royalty. Some may think me completely ridiculous, not telling the boys who we are and making them treat us with the respect we deserve.

_But maybe I just want to see what I'm missing._


	90. The Avatar and the Fire Lord

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Avatar and the Fire Lord (0**90**/100)  
**Word count**: 333 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: Thank you to **kasplosion** for my **300****th** review (here alone!!) and thank you **EVERYONE** for **20,000** hits (here alone again!!); I couldn't do it without all your support! And now as it is, I am on my **90****th **drabble, **10 **drabbles away from being finished! It's been a big undertaking, but now the end is in sight and I cannot believe I've come so far._ I'll be doing a big thank you list on my 100__th__ drabble, but this it for now. :)_

* * *

**The Avatar and the Fire Lord**

_Evil and good are always at war inside you, Zuko. It is your nature, your legacy. _

He doesn't have to tell me twice. I know the feeling completely and totally, having been slapped in the face by it so many times. Every time I try to do good, somehow everything goes wrong. And when I try the opposite, nothing ever feels right.

I'm stuck in between two extremes, unable to move toward either one.

_But there is a bright side. What happened generations ago can be resolved now…by you. Because of your legacy, you alone can cleanse the sins of our family and the fire nation. Born in you, along with all this strife, is the power to restore __balance__ to the world._

The first time he tells me this, I cannot understand. I am too confused and upset and just plain _angry_ to try and search through his words to find the true meaning of what he is telling me. _(Why are you telling me this?)_

The second time he tells me this, it is in my head. I am once again trying to pull away from one extreme and reach towards the other, questioning why I even was on that side to begin with._ (I was the perfect prince, the son my father always wanted………but I wasn't me.)_

The third time he tells me this, I have it memorized word for word. I recite it to myself as a mantra as I walk towards the door, a place I am praying I will somehow escape alive from. (_I know I made some bad choices. But today, I'm going to set things right_.)

The fourth time is when I finally get it. _(After I leave here today, I'm going to free Uncle Iroh from his prison and I'm going beg for his forgiveness. He's the one who's been a real father to me.)_

And it's too late. He's already gone.


	91. The Runaway

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles

**Chapter Title**: The Runaway (091/100)

**Word count**: 171

**Rating**: G

**Warnings**: none

**Notes**: I know some of you are probably wondering what happened to me yesterday—**I'm alright, mostly**—_there's just been some problems at home that will be keeping me from being able to update every day like I've been doing_, sadly enough. D: So while I _will_ try to get all the drabbles finished (up until the episodes that have NOT yet been released, which I will wait for), I don't know which days will be the days when I'll be able to update and so forth.

Please stick with me, I'm trying to get matters sorted out as soon as possible. :)

* * *

**The Runaway**

_They were controlling over you, so you ran away, and now you act like your parents don't exist. You act like you hate them, but you don't. You just feel guilty._

I'm the one who can feel the vibrations in the earth and tell people's feelings and their lies, I'm the one who can see what so many people with working eyes cannot. I'm the one who is possibly the greatest earthbender in the world—the strongest _young__ girl_ in the world. I say this all with pride and comfort, _because it's who I am_. It's who I've always been, almost all that I can remember anymore.

And yet, she sees right through me. She, the one who is so completely blind to _countless_ things, sees _me_. The me I've hidden for so long; the cowardly little blind girl who cannot control _anything_ in her life.

She's right. _She's __so __right_, and that's what scares me the most.


	92. The Puppetmaster

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Puppetmaster (092/100)  
**Word count**: _100!_** Rating**: PG (violence implications) **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: SO SORRY I've been gone so long—first I'd been banned from the internet, embarrassingly enough, and then I got really busy with various projects, vacations and other things leading up until the Season 3 Finale. But I'm back—and I hope to finish this drabble set very soon! (And I hope you enjoy the last few drabbles)

* * *

**The Puppetmaster**

_Then you should understand what I'm talking about. We're the last Waterbenders of the Southern Tribe. We have to fight these people whenever we can. Wherever they are, with __any__ means necessary!_

It was like every cliché about missing puzzle pieces and links in a chain she had ever heard, the words finally triggering a connection she had ignored all along. And it was not in slow motion that her gaze snapped to the other woman, seeing lines and clenched muscles and darkness that she had missed before.

_Any means…you should understand…we…have to fight…we…any means…we…we…__**we**__._

Hadn't she heard all of those lines before?


	93. Nightmares and Daydreams

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Nightmares and Daydreams (093/100)  
**Word count**: 100 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: I had a hard time with this ending—I went to look up "umpteenth" in the dictionary to make sure I had the right idea what the definition was—and in doing so, _completely_ lost my train of thought. So I'm sure the rest of the sentence was infinitely better originally (in my head), but this was all I could come up with afterward and type up…

Also, sorry this is a week or so after the last update; I've been working in the day and watching Michael Phelps at night. XD

**

* * *

Nightmares and Daydreams**

_Well good. You shouldn't. Why would you even want to go__‌__?__Just think about how things went at the last war meeting you went to.  
_

She doesn't mean to say it. She is just trying to comfort him in the only way she knows—pretend disinterest to what's troubling him. _She doesn't mean to say it at all._ The words just come out before she can stop them, dredging up a horrific image of his past that he would've rather she left well enough alone.

He turns away.

And she wishes for the umpteenth time that things were different. _That she was different_.


	94. Day of Black Sun

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Day of Black Sun (094/100)  
**Word count**: 146 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: If you find this a bit confusing, let me tell you that the second paragraph is all Zuko's thoughts. After that it transfers back to third person.

**

* * *

Day of Black Sun**

_Coward! You think you're brave enough to face me but you'll only do it during an eclipse. If you have any real courage, you'll stick around until the Sun comes out. Don't you want to know what happened to your mother__‌?_

He's the coward. He is the one who burned his defenseless son and felt no remorse. He's the one who sits on a plush throne while hundreds of men die for him—and others who die _because_ of him—on the open battlefield and feels no responsibility. He's the one who would have _let his only son die_—and would have done the murder _himself_ without a second thought. _He's_ the coward, he's the_ coward_, _he's the coward_. But……_Mother_…

The falter of steps echoes in the near-empty room and the older face regains its trademark smirk immediately. _Zuko was always the weaker of his two children, after all._


	95. The Western Air Temple

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Western Air Temple (095/100)  
**Word count**: 287 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: random tangents—but it's Zuko, after all. xD **  
****Notes**: Ehh, I hate first person perspective. But first person is needed to make this drabble truly effective, so…

**

* * *

The Western Air Temple**

_You might have everyone else buying your...__"transformation,__" but you and I both know you've struggled with doing the right thing in the past._

She just doesn't understand. To her, the world is made up entirely of black and white—there's no gray area, no space in between good and bad. When I tried to capture the Avatar I was evil and she wanted nothing to do with me. When we connected in Ba Sing Se I was good and she was ready to try and heal me of my scar—forever. Then when I joined Azula I was evil again—and she hated me more than when I was chasing the Avatar. And suddenly she treated me like I had a bright red label on my forehead—"Can't-ever-be-good-again," I'm sure it said.

She just doesn't see that the world is_ not_ entirely made up of black and white. _People _are not made up entirely of either black or white, are not entirely good or entirely evil. I've made a lot of mistakes in my life—but I'm trying to make up for them, I'm trying to 'build new bridges' in places there previously was only ashes. I'm_ trying_. I'm not perfect—she doesn't need to remind me of that fact. And she acts like _she's_ never made a mistake—never made a mistake she'll always regret.

_So let me tell you something right now. You make one step backward, one slip up, give me one reason to think you might hurt Aang, and you won't have to worry about your destiny anymore. Because I'll make sure your destiny ends, right then and there. __Permanently__._

I guess I'm saying that I just don't understand why she gives me the world to hold when she already knows I'll drop it.


	96. The Firebending Masters

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Firebending Masters (096/100)  
**Word count**: 648! **Rating**: G **Warnings**: more ramblings…this time from a different character.**  
****Notes**: I figured after the last drabble I didn't need to do another one with Zuko and/or Katara. xD That's where this one came from—or at least _started _from, anyway. This was _supposed_ to be a drabble—_short and sweet_—but once I got going **I just couldn't stop**.

So enjoy…quite the long drabble that it is. XD

**

* * *

The Firebending Masters**

_It's like the monks used to tell me. Sometimes, the shadows of the past can be felt by the present._

I close my eyes and in the black void I can see my past—even just this past year—fly by in my mind's eye. Going back is not so difficult when you have spent most of your life in suspended animation—in an iceberg for a hundred years, no less. The monks always taught me that those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it—and so I remember.

I was born into the peaceful air nomads more than a hundred years ago, a time when airbending was not so uncommon in the world. I learned my natural element with ease, mastering it long before other boys my age did. In fact, I may have been the only boy my age with the airbending tattoos signifying my mastery of the element. I'm the Avatar—but I was an airbender first. Waterbending was possibly even easier than airbending for me—because I had a great teacher and a natural knack for it. I came to earthbending and was stumped—my natural opposite, it was the hardest thing I had ever tried to do before. But with yet another great teacher I got over my mental block and overcame that element too, bringing my mastery of the elements up to three elements.

Three—out of the four.

_All this time, I thought firebending was destruction. _

I had only one element left—and very little time to master it in. Even worse was the fact that…well, I was _scared_. I had hurt the one person that mattered most to me—_while firebending_. I had then vowed to never firebend again—I couldn't bear to hurt anyone else (_hurt her_) ever again. Scared and angry, I refused to acknowledge the firebender in myself—especially when I saw how much destruction it caused.

The Fire Nation may have been masters of their element—but they were also masters of pain and destruction, of war and violence. _Of blood and death_. It didn't help that the crown—albeit, _banished_—Prince of the Fire Nation was constantly chasing me, trying to bring me to the center of evil in the world—the Fire Lord himself.

He just wouldn't give up—even after all that happened at the North Pole and all that happened in the spring that lead up to the second battle of Ba Sing Se. I died and was reborn and grew hair and shaved it again before he decided what his father wanted wasn't what _he_ wanted after all.

And then he burned Toph's feet and did a heck of a lot more damage while trying to join us before we were ready to accept him—before he _saved_ us and said words that brought me into the past once more.

_I'm sorry what I did to you—it was an accident. Fire can be dangerous and wild—so as a firebender, I need to be more careful and control my bending so I don't hurt people __unintentionally._

I look at him in another light, a different one than I have seen him in since we met. I realize that this is him—_this is the core of who Zuko is_, _who he has always been._ He too knows the pain and danger of fire, the destruction it can cause—and also the life it can bring. We were both just too blinded by our differences—_by the war, by different pressures_—to see each others' true selves. Toph was right when she wondered who was really the blind one in our group—certainly not her. The rest of us were looking with our eyes—but none of us were truly _seeing_. Now that he's joined the group and we've gone a mission to find firebending again—for the both of us—I can see for the first time.

And I know that it's time to let go (_of old grudges, old impressions, old ideas, old fears_) and fall—

I'm not afraid anymore.

_Fire is life, not just destruction._


	97. The Boiling Rock

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Boiling Rock (097/100)  
**Word count**: 200 **Rating**: PG  
**Warnings**: more inner ramblings from yet _another_ character—this one with _very_ intriguing thoughts**  
****Notes**: Second quote is actually _not_ from the episode—it's a couple sentences of my own making, from drabble #037: Existence. The funny thing is that I wrote that drabble _before_ this episode and obviously before the finale. I knew Azula too well, I guess—knew (been _writing_) her long enough to know she'd have a meltdown before she actually _did_. xD

**

* * *

The Boiling Rock**

_I guess __you don't know people as well as you think you do. You miscalculated—I love Zuko more than I fear you. _

Possessing no longer an expressionless face is a testament to my shock—_I truly never saw this coming_. Of all the things I predicted for the near future, this was for sure not one of them. It is a first—though as I think this, my mind flings back to that one night on the beach, that one night I reflected on an inconsistency (_an imperfection_) in my life…

_She's gone—long gone—and Father's opinion is enough for the both of them…I tell myself this even now, repeating it in my mind over and over again to the point where that little ounce of doubt I have is tiny enough to not be there at all. __And yet, it's still there. Always there, just waiting…waiting for the day when this tangled web of lies I've spun finally begins to unravel and fall to pieces…_

I concentrate once more on the situation at hand (_when has my concentration ever been shaken?_) before that little voice in my head (_when did I ever have one?_) remarks that_ today is that day_—the day I have feared.


	98. The Southern Raiders

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Southern Raiders (098/100)  
**Word count**: 223 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: none**  
****Notes**: These are Zuko's thoughts…sometime before the end of the episode when Katara forgives him.

**

* * *

The Southern Raiders**

_You really wanna know? Hmm, maybe you could re-conquer Ba Sing Se in the name__ of the Earth King? Or, I know—you could bring my mother back! _

She was just harboring so much rage inside (_a burden so many of us tend to bare during this war_) that she needed to take it out on someone—_anyone_. She felt just so much _pain_ from her mother's tragic end that she needed an escape from the raw hurt, from the world now empty of the most important person in her life.

_This isn't fair. Everyone else seems to trust me now. What is it with you?_

She just needed someone to blame—and that burden fell to me. I was an easy enough target—the Fire Nation Prince who _had_, in fact, _harmed her and tried to capture the world's greatest hope more often than not_. The early rage she had for me I deserved. The raw pain I heard in her voice and the tears in the catacombs of Ba Sing Se was something I had partly caused. Even the initial anger she had after I joined Azula instead was completely well deserved. I've deserved a lot of her rage, especially after I lost her trust—but not this.

Strangely enough, I'm no longer angry about it.

I forgive her. _If only she could treat me with the same mercy._


	99. The Ember Island Players

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: The Ember Island Players (**099**/100)  
**Word count**: 100 **Rating**: G **Warnings**: Aang's feelings, which you more or less might disagree/agree with**  
****Notes**: Only **one** more drabble to go! :O

**

* * *

The Ember Island Players**

_Aang... I don't know._

_Because we're in the middle of a war and we have other things to worry about. This isn't the right time. _

I don't understand—I keep putting my heart on a platter for her and she keeps giving it _back_ to me, time and time again. I just cannot conceive how her feelings can be so clouded when mine are so clear—so clearly for_ her_. Ever since she found me in the iceberg she's been my one constant in life—always at my side, always ready to help and soothe.

I guess I just can't imagine life without her.


	100. Sozin's Comet

**Title**: 100 Days, 100 Drabbles  
**Chapter Title**: Sozin's Comet (**100**/100)  
**Word count**: 100, 100, 100 and _100_ ;) **Rating**: PG **Warnings**: none **  
****Notes**: **THE END IS HERE**. _Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who took the time to_ _read and review ALL one hundred of these_—and thanks also to anyone who stopped by to check out any number of these drabbles! They wouldn't have been completed without the support of all of my readers—thank you so much! And here's to the end—cheers! Hope you enjoy this last drabble.

And actually, there's **FOUR** drabbles in one (because I love you all so much) because I figured the finale was SO big that I should take a little bit from each part/episode of the finale and make a drabble for each part/episode. :)

**Last note for those missing any of the drabbles**: All of these drabbles can either be found on my LJ (**catalyst283**) or on my FF profile (**fearlessgurl283**).

_

* * *

_

Sozin's Comet

* * *

**The Phoenix King**

_This goes against everything I learned from the monks. I can't just go around wiping out people I don't like. _

I'm not scared, weak or nervous. I'm not opting to 'take the easy way out'. I'm not doing this to try and save my own life—I'm not doing this for _any_ of the reasons everyone else seems to think I'm doing it for. I'm against killing him…because I just can't end things this way.

I can't—_won't_—stoop to his level.

I won't be a killer.

**

* * *

The Old Masters**

_Uncle, I know you must have mixed feelings about seeing me. But I want you to know... I am so, so sorry uncle. I am so sorry and ashamed of what I did! I don't know how I can ever make it up to you, but I... _

He feels the tears coming as he envelops his nephew into a hug (_you found your way all by yourself; I am so unbelievably proud of you_) and he closes his eyes in true happiness. He knows that if everything ends differently than planned, he will be content—_pleased_—with this much.

**

* * *

Into the Inferno**

_You're weak! Just like the rest of your people. They did not deserve to exist in this world, in __my__ world. Prepare to join them! Prepare to __die!_

The boy is no match for his raw power.

The Fire Nation had sent so many people out in search of the Avatar for _decades_ because they thought he was a powerful old man—he laughs now at the ridiculously young boy in front of him. This Avatar has seen and done nothing—_nothing_ compared to what _he_ has done.

The death of the Avatar will be nothing, _nothing at all_.

**

* * *

Avatar Aang**

_I wanted to do a painting so we always remember the good times together._

We are a group of very different people—people of all of the nations and elements, benders and non-benders alike. Some of us were enemies in the beginning, others were enemies to themselves. We are different ages, with different wisdom. We are so very different—but it only took one thing to bring us all together.

Now that the war is done we will go our different ways and things will never be the same again.

_I want to remember our last day together_ _forever_.


End file.
